


Hyperbole, but whispered

by 13434x



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Character Study, Friends With Benefits, Homesick Lance (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, Lance (Voltron) Has ADHD, M/M, Pining Lance (Voltron), Temporary Character Death, Trans Keith (Voltron), also a lot of kisses in this one lads
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:15:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 49,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26486275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/13434x/pseuds/13434x
Summary: "It reminds me of the sun.”"The sun is prettier,” Lance mumbled."It is.”A crescendo filled the inside of Lance’s chest as the star lit up the interior of the vehicle, and the words were out of his mouth before he even registered the inevitability of them."Like you,” he whispered, ”pretty like you, Keith.”-Aegis, a planet that floods itself every thousand years, is left especially vulnerable in the threat of a galra invasion, a threat that urgently sends the Paladins of Voltron on a mission against nature itself to rescue the entire population of the planet; meanwhile, Lance personally sets out to mend his rocky relationship with one certain Red Paladin—preferably before they all succumb to the wake of the Great Wave—and then maybe, hopefully, he’ll manage to find his way home across the entire universe while he’s at it.
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 14
Kudos: 32





	Hyperbole, but whispered

**Author's Note:**

> This is a lot of pretentiousness packed into a ? chapter story, will be sporadically updated throughout the years bc I'm a slow writer and fear the word count on this bad boy. If I finish writing it before I remember to update I'll just make this a full story without chapters. You can find more detailed content warnings (unfortunately including spoilers) in the end notes.
> 
> here's a [playlist for part one](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2Y2HeA5wRqKIFNuk42vj1d?si=-KRkq7F1TZyq7dlh46MC5A)

There in the twilight cold and gray,

lifeless, but beautiful, he lay,

and from the sky, serene and far,

a voice fell like a falling star.

_— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ”Excelsior”_

_Earth, five years ago_

  
  


_Lance McClain’s wrist is broken. He knows this because of the way his whole arm seems to vibrate, like tiny ants crawling up and down his skin. This is not the first time that Lance has broken a bone—it’s not even the first time that he’s broken this specific bone—but he can’t muster up the urgency to check for crooked joints or open wounds. Something else has caught his attention, something much more important, much greater than a broken wrist._

_Above him, far up there, through the thin stalks of their backyard tree that he’s just fallen from, is the entire universe. Spread out for as far as he can see. Stars blinking down on him, teasing him for laying there on the grass instead of soaring up towards infinity. And it’s here, while staring up at the infinities of space, that something in Lance’s chest turns tangible; growing and growing until it pushes at his ribs, demands to be freed from the containment of his body._

_He’s not sure if it was the fall to the ground that had him gasping for air or the unfathomable weight of the sky above him—but the feeling of being stretched out at all directions remained the same either way._

_Slowly, but surely, Lance raises his trembling hand up and up and up, ever onwards, reaching out for the night, for the sky, for_ someone _. Slim fingers blending together with the crown of the tree and the black spots swimming in the corner of his eyes._

One day _, Lance whispers to himself,_ one day I’ll touch the stars.

_The stars only blink back at him, a message he hasn’t figured out how to decode yet, both a challenge and a promise._

_Lance closes his eyes._

  
  


_A few galaxies away, present-day_

Space, Lance had figured by now, was a big, _big_ place, like, truly humongous—and so, knowing this, he really shouldn’t have been as surprised as he was by the very boring nature of their half-day long trip through cosmos.

Lance knew about the infinity of space even before he went up here. Mostly because of the countless nights spent in the backyard of his house in Varadero, sleeping in a scrappy tent with all four of his siblings. He remembered specifically looking out of a makeshift window that Marco dared him to cut out of the roof of the tent itself; he remembered them simply lounging together, gazing up into the sky through the choppy square until keeping their eyes open turned into a competition. When their mama finally allowed Luis to stay in the tent with them (on the condition that one of them came back inside with him before bedtime) Lance would have to poke him in the ribs every other minute to make sure he stayed awake. He could sit like that forever, Lance used to think, Luis in his lap, neck bent to stare into the luminous sky, gasping as he caught a star falling once every now and then. The greatness of it all had them in trans; the impossible size of the sky, a riddle waiting to be solved. So many nights without sleep and still none of them managed to come up with any answers.

Never did Lance ever expect that he would grow wary of looking at the stars, and yet, here he was a few years later, slowly driven out of his mind by the pale dots in the dark. The _eight thousand six hundred and thirty-five_ pale dots, to be exact. Lance would know, because he’d counted them perhaps equally as many times now, drawn a detailed connect-the-dots kind of cluster on the star map displayed on Blue’s dashboard just to be sure they were actually there. Team Voltron sure had encountered their fair share of loopy galaxies and really-out-there-planets on their journeys, but this was a whole other kind of unease. Here the darkness felt almost intruding, as if the longer Lance stared into it, the more the stars seemed to fade and leave him floating in absolutely nothing, all alone in the confinement of his armor, facing himself in a way he never thought he’d have to—oblivion _lite_.

How Lance had managed to fool himself into thinking they had evaded ending up in the weirdly forgettable backpockets of space was as much a mystery to him as to everyone else.

Space was a lot of things. Full of creatures and phenomenon Lance couldn’t possibly know how to begin picturing in his mind. Infinite to the point of unimaginable. So mindbogglingly huge and suffocatingly empty at the same time (multiple realities had even turned out to exist—yeah, fucking _multiple realities)_ and so, it wasn’t exactly a revolutionary idea to think they had all ended up in a part of the universe that couldn’t be described as anything else but ’empty space’. They were actually _bound_ to end up on a soul-crushingly boring, hallucination prone, half-day long mission through pure nothing-ness, like, _mathematically_ , but the hard reality of that fact didn’t exactly make the journey any easier to suffer through.

Traveling for hours through a pitch black void, with the exception of some feeble excuses of stars dusted far into the background, was not necessarily Lance’s favorite way of wasting time. He’d definitely much rather drift through the stardust graveyards he could hint at a couple of lightyears away on Blue’s star map, looking for scraps or something _,_ if only for the slimmest entertainment stimulation, but no, he was stuck right here on their beeline through the middle of nowhere. Even the wide range of intriguingly blinking buttons on Blue’s dashboard had started becoming kind of boring after the bazillionth time he’d found himself prodding at them, and Blue’s warning growls didn’t exactly encourage him to keep it up. _Not_ that Lance hated flying long term missions in Blue or anything. _No way_ , _babey._ Blue was his favorite girl in the entirety of cosmos; her gentle purring, the comfort of her metaphorical embraces, playing ’I spy’ for hours without her ever getting tired. Honestly, what’s not to love?

Even out here, in the endless dark, Blue kind of reminded him of his mama in a way—but Lance would rather be the test bunny for his own recipe of food goo before admitting this to anyone aloud, ever. There was just… _something_ about the gentle way Blue nudged on his consciousness that reminded Lance of his mama’s palm caressing his cheek to wake him up every time he accidentally fell asleep on various furniture and surfaces around the house, and getting to feel that again even though he was lightyears away from his real mama was really nice. But sometimes, though—only _sometimes—_ it made the aching disorientation in Lance even worse, when those tiny moments of recognition came in like a slap across the face instead of gentle caressing. On those days it was extra hard to forget that his mama’s not anywhere close to him right now. It didn’t matter how many fuzzy, maternal feelings Blue showered him with, because as soon as he stepped out of the cockpit it would feel like plunging down from the edge of a skyscraper.

To be fair, in the castle-ship there was at least Hunk’s semi-Earth inspired cuisine to be eaten in comfort, games to be played and get lost in, real, actual _people_ to physically interact with—you know, distractions, or whatever. Out here though, in the middle of exactly nowhere, it was unavoidable to confront the fact that it was just Lance for as far as his eyes could see. It was just so goddamn _empty_. A blank space with absolutely nothing for his cluttered mind to focus on—not a single cool star cluster or planet to gaze at while they traveled. Only him and the eight thousand flickering pale dots in front of him, that Lance was half convinced he’d imagined up himself.

(And sometimes when Lance floated like this in Blue, despite hearing the other paladins’ occasionalchatter through the open comm link, despite the very presence of Blue in his head, he felt as though his existence was only secondary compared to the vast infinite of space).

It was a few hours into Lance’s agony when Coran’s static voice informed them over the comm that _actually, you are all surrounded by colors unimaginable to your minds, colors not even myself or Allura can fathom_. As if that was just another daily _fun-fact_. It did not help at all with curing Lance’s insanity induced boredom. If anything it only made him fidget and complain with amplified fervency. Just, like, imagine the largest case of space FOMO you possibly can, and then add an unmedicated ADHD diagnose onto that, and there you have the mental state of Lance McClain caged in a giant space cat for twelve hours being told he’s currently traveling right through unknown colors that he unfortunately can’t see.

With Blue set on something close to autopilot, his feet dangling over the armrest of his chair and hand lazily keeping his head from tilting onto his shoulder, Lance did exactly what all of his teachers has told him not to do, and dissociated. Imagined a world in exuberant colors. Colors with familiar names, _visible_ to his human eyes. Where noises reverberates in his ears; where the chirping of birds and the howling wind by the shore merges in consonance. Where he knows every steppingstone, every crossroad, every pathway like the back of his hand. Where the air smells of saltwater and diesel and has just the right amount of oxygen to be breathable; a conundrum, a _perfect_ combination.

Although, nowadays it’s easier to remember a reality that isn’t any of these things.

An impenetrable darkness present at every hour of the day. Endless, gray-scaled corridors. Food that doesn’t taste like anything he can wrap his mind around. Languages he’ll never be able to speak, not even a little, because the sounds required are humanly impossible for him to make. It’s pretty easy to imagine the abrupt ending of things Lance had just taken for granted, to feel the fading of memories since long stored in the back of his head; to feel the loss, the fracture left behind; to desperately imagine his hands, outstretched towards the sky—a familiar gesture, reaching ever upwards, _Excelsior, Leandro, do you know what that means?—_ only to realize the sky here is nothing like the sky on Earth.

It’s like that every time they land on a planet where it rains, but the raindrops are spiky. Or pink. Or scolding hot. Where that added element of wonder and magic should make him gasp in awe—and it _did_ , it _used_ to… but not anymore, because that added element of wonder and magic was just another missing element of home. Lance was so tired of adventure, of dreamlike civilizations and otherworldly… worlds. He’s tired. And homesick. Probably a little loopy from the cabin-fever.

And incessantly bored.

He let his head drop backwards and groaned, dragging the sound out as obnoxiously long as he could until he heard Keith groan back through the comms.

”What _now_ ,” Keith snapped and it was almost freaky how easily Lance could imagine the way he grinded his weirdly sharp teeth together in agitation—almost freaky, if not for the fact that Lance has witnessed in detail every single thing about Keith by now that one can after being stuck together on a limited area in space for a year. It would take something extremely out of character for Lance to be surprised by anything Keith-related, and Keith never got out of character, so: _jackpot_ , he thought, mentally rubbing his hands together.

”Are we _there_ yet,” Lance whined, like an actual five year old nagging on his mom from the backseat of a station wagon, only this time Lance felt justified in his whining. He needed a break. A pause. A distraction from this impending mental breakdown that kept creeping up on him, and Keith had _always_ been a good distraction.

_Too good,_ a tiny voice spoke up in the back of his mind, but Lance whisked that thought away just as fleetingly as it appeared.

”We’ve been over this like _ten_ times the past hour,” Keith hissed over the comm. Lance chuckled for himself, wiggled his feet back and forth. It was _so easy_ to pick his own brain for an image of blotchy red spots of frustration on Keiths pale skin, traveling up his slender neck, manifesting on his cheeks; and the way his thick eyebrows furrows over his long eyelashes, and the cute little wrinkle right in the middle— _wait_. Lance’s feet froze mid air as he caught himself from letting that line of thought travel any further than it already had, immediately erasing the mental image of a worked up Keith from his mind. Nothing good would come out of that.

”—we’ll get there when we get there, there’s _literally_ nothing we can do to make this go faster,” Keith continued in that dark growl of his, as if Lance’s whole mental state hadn’t just shifted slightly to the left. Suddenly it wasn’t as fun to tease Keith anymore.

Lance pouted, even though he knew no one could see his dissatisfaction at the sudden turn of event.

”We could have wormholed there,” he muttered back, barely audible since he knew this discussion would get him nowhere except on Keith’s bad side again—but Keith was a scab Lance couldn’t stop prodding at, and his freaky galra hearing snapped it up anyway. The sound Keith made in response reverberated through Blue as if he intentionally knocked into her with Red.

”You _know_ we couldn’t! God, why do you always have to be such a—”

” _Keith_ ,” Shiro called out through the comm line, effectively shutting Keith up and sparing Lance the pleasure of knowing exactly how much he inconveniences Keith and the rest of the team. A little too late though, he figured, clutching his chest-plate as Keith’s heavily implied insults fully manifested in Lance’s mind. He could feel his own retaliation coming up his throat like some kind of word-bile, but _yeah, Keith, you think you’re so fucking—_ was all Lance managed before he got an equally frustrated interruption from their resident Head of Lion.

” _Lance,_ you too. Just leave it—both of you,” Shiro reprimanded, sounding more like an exasperated parent than the respected Black Paladin of Voltron right then. Lance sunk further down into his seat, arms crossed over his chest. If this was a screen call Lance bet he would have seen Shiro kneading his fingers into his temples in a feeble attempt to will away his incoming headache. ”We’ll be there in just thirsty minutes or so, Lance. Just hold on for thirty more minutes—” Lance scoffed, loud enough for Shiro to hear ”—you can even see the star from here,” Shiro finished in a long sigh, which had Lance practically vaulting out of his seat after a second of processing. He pressed his palms over the dashboard and leaned as far as he could to stare into the black pit of nothing in front of them, and _there_ —far, far out there in front of them, was a tiny but distinct dot of light.

” _Wow_ ,” Hunk breathed, and Lance couldn’t do anything but agree. Wow, indeed _._ There it was. Lance felt like he should have had some kind of beautiful metaphor to match the emotions he felt now that he was finally seeing evidence of this tiny planet they’ve travelled almost a day in empty space for, but he couldn't find any words to describe it.

”That’s—” Allura said, and then the comm did something weird and Lance swore he just heard the recording of a cellphone in the process of getting microwaved through a concert stadium speaker.

”Jesus fuck, that’s _so_ _not_ it,” he shrieked after a lagging second of pure audio-torture, his shoulders instinctively hunched up to the degree of almost covering his ears.

”Uh,” Shiro followed up, hesitantly, ”what was that again, princess?”

”I just said we’ve finally reached—” and then that awful sound screeched through all five of the lions again.

” _Christ_ , what is that _sound_?” Pidge yelped and Lance was just happy he wasn’t the only one having a brain aneurysm.

A vague, pained string of curses went whispered almost unnoticeably in the background, but Lance immediately recognized Keith’s voice. His eyes flickered to the left where he knew the red lion was flying somewhere in the distance, and felt kind of bad now for talking shit about Keith’s heightened galra senses. Allura spoke up again in question, but that crackling, banshee-shriek sound was the only thing being translated over the comm. Lance heard Keith loudly cringing this time over the noise as if catching the sight of a sinking ship in the eye of a beacon from the top of a lighthouse.

”Stop!” he shouted, both his palms smashing right back onto Blue’s dashboard in his hasty ascent from his chair. ”Allura—stop talking!” The noise tuned out immediately at his command and Lance forced the pulsing aftershock in his ears to quiet down as he listened for any further sound coming from Keith, but the insistent complaints from Hunk and Pidge corrupted the whole comm link. Even Shiro sighed in relief at the silence.

”There seems to be a technical issue, princess. We can only hear some kind of… mechanical noise when you speak. Is there a problem with the comm?” Shiro questioned and Allura made an inquisitive huff at their reactions, not daring to speak just yet.

”Can you hear me?” she said eventually, lowering her voice as to not cause any harm to the paladins.

”Sure can, princess,” Lance answered after a few seconds, but furrowed his eyebrows in concentration as he still tried to listen in on how Keith was doing on his end.

”I don’t quite know what the problem is… I’m just saying the name of the planet?” Allura started, raising her voice again as the audio seemed to go back to normal, but then Coran’s voice interrupted her feed.

”I’m fairly sure I can explain what is going on, princess!” he chirped happily, as if their eardrums didn’t just almost collectively implode. ”The species of this planet is, as you’re all well informed of already, incredibly adaptable and protective of their own. They usually speak on a frequency inaudible, and in some cases _unbearable_ , to anyone outside of their species, verbal attacks being one of their most instinctive weapons in combat. Which means that their language has been a hard nut to translate ever since the first time they came into contact with us alteans. In fact, we have only managed to speak with them because of our shapeshifting abilities and their fortunate affinity to mimicing sounds and learning foreign languages— _anyhow_ ,” Coran said, an impatient cough from Allura in the background, ”I can only imagine their self-preservation has evolved further during the 10.000 years we’ve been in cryo-sleep, until the point of their language simply being untranslatable for our comms.”

”But we heard it all fine back in the castle when Allura had the briefing?” Pidge questioned. And, well, Lance wouldn’t exactly say they heard it _all fine_ , since he recalled not catching a single letter or sound coming out of Allura’s mouth as she told them the name of the planet and the primary species living there. But that’s neither here nor there, he supposed, since they at least didn’t get their ears impaled at the time.

”I have no idea what this planet is called,” Keith commented suddenly, who hadn’t even been in the castle during the meeting about the planet because of a blade mission, but even despite that, Lance was too busy unclenching his fists in relief at the sound of his bored tone to care that Mr. Straight-A’s-Student McMullet just admitted to not knowing something for once.

”It’s actually a very fitting name,” Coran mused on. ”I don’t really know the best way to translate it, but I would say the closest human concept would be that of a guardian, or perhaps a shield. It’s a word for being under the protective wing of a higher power, but also that higher power being in your own hands as a tool, quite literally.”

”Well, that’s very interesting and all but wouldn’t it be easier for us to call it an actual name?” Pidge urged on, clearly ready for the conversation to come to a conclusion as the nameless planet of topic only grew bigger in front of them.

”I suppose it would,” Coran replied, ”although, it has been an awful long time since the alteans reached out to our fellow allies, and I can’t say I really know the current customs and traditions of—” and there the comm started sounding like metal pipes going through a grinder tool again.

Keith hissed immediately and, for Lance, that was an even worse sound.

” _Aegis!_ ” he found himself shouting, the screeching nature of the planet’s name evaporating into abrupt silence.

”Bless you, my boy,” Coran responded after a brief pause. Allura’s groan reverberated through the comm.

”I apologize, paladins,” she said, quickly followed by, ”what was that you just said, Lance?”

Lance inhaled slowly, ears strained.

”Aegis,” he said again, softly, not wanting to cause Keith more hurt than necessary.

The word had come to Lance instantly, as if it had been simmering below the surface of his mind this whole time. _Your wit is your aegis_ , his tío Jaime had laughed once, several years ago, as they walked out of his school together after a disciplinary meeting with his teacher, _honestly, I have no idea what trickster god you’ve made a pact with, sunshine, and I’m not sure I even really want to know_. Lance’s big mouth had once again gotten him involved in a fight he hadn’t even started, but also managed to talk his way out of it afterwards. _You better not tell your mama about this_ , his tío had continued, ruffled Lance’s hair and effectively earned himself a squawk from the younger boy in return. Lance was just entering that age where his hair was the utmost important thing, no touching allowed, but he figured arguing with the one adult he knew wouldn’t get him in trouble was counterproductive to his will to live. Immediately after arriving back home and shoving his shoes off, he’d sprinted up the stairs to his room to research what an _aegis_ was. _To be under someone’s aegis—to be protected by a powerful, benevolent source._ And, well, his mama never did figure out about the meeting.

”Oh my god, _Percy Jackson!_ ” Hunk squealed, pulling Lance out of his flashback with a wince at the volume. ”Ah, I loved those books, man. Good memories.”

Pidge immediately gushed her love of Percy Jackson over the comm as well, musing together with Hunk about the books of their childhood. Lance had also read the Percy Jackson books, although a bit later than the others since it was around that time of the hype that they were figuring out the whole thing about his ADHD and dyslexia. He really tried reading all those books his peers loved to talk about, but he could honestly not understand the whole _looking at letters on a bunch of stacked paper for hours_ schtick. Later on, he got to enjoy the stories with he help of audio books instead and immediately found himself devoured by the adventures of the olympic heroes, reeling with kinship to the characters own struggles, his mama smiling fondly at this discovery… only now, all his friends had moved on to other interests and Lance found himself all alone in his excitement.

”Aegis?” Allura said after a solid minute of trying to understand their chatter, not sounding completely put off, albeit a bit confused. ”And what is a _percyjackson_?”

”Psh, only the best modern take on greek mythology _ever,”_ Pidge snorted with Hunk agreeing in tow.

”Greek mythology?” Allura inquired further, definitely perking up with curious interest, and this was probably the moment Shiro realized they’d only circle around like this for the rest of the journey if he continued letting Pidge control the handles of the conversation.

”They’re talking about ancient Earth legends and myths rewritten into child appropriate stories, princess,” he explained, causing both Pidge and Hunk to break out into various noises of disappointment and disgruntlement over the comm link.

”Aegis is like, a cloth or something belonging to Athena, the goddess of wisdom and strategic warfare,” Keith offered from out of nowhere, and Lance spluttered at his sudden input.

” _You’ve_ read the Percy Jackson books?” he said, as if accusing Keith of a crime, but Lance didn’t even really know himself why this was such revolting news to him. He knew Keith liked to read, if the countless times he’d found him in the castle library nose deep into a book explaining various alien societies was anything to go by. But the thought of Keith with a Percy Jackson book in hand, all cozied up in a warm blanket, reading for fun rather than necessity, clashed violently with the loner, desert-child image he already had firmly intertwined with the guy. And yet, that really didn’t explain why he started blushing furiously at how _right_ this new information about Keith felt. Like another piece of a puzzle falling into place.

”I _know_ how to read,” Keith snapped back in defense, and Lance _burned_ with the urge to ask him if he’d read any other books Lance would recognize, if he found solicitude and composure in words on a piece of paper, if he collected books the same way Lance collected NASA posters—but instead of asking any of these things, he clenched down on his jaws and gulped all the questions down his throat. There was a time when Lance thought he would have gotten an answer to all his questions, but that ship had sailed without him even noticing.

” _Aegis_ ,” Allura said, interrupting whatever bickering was about to begin, rolling the word across her tongue as if it was something she could taste. ”I like it—brilliant display of quick thinking, Lance,” she praised and sounded earnestly impressed.

This in turn only made Lance blush even more.

” _Oh_ , well, ah—y’know, there’s a lot more where that came from, princess,” he stammered, trying his best to lay on the flirtatious vibe thick so there’s no mistaking his words for what they really are.

”Yeah, thinking isn’t the _only_ thing about him that comes quick,” Pidge deadpanned and the comm link erupted into a wide range of different responses.

” _Ouff_ , mean one, Pidge,” Hunk said, loyal as always to his best friend, yet Lance didn’t think he sounded as offended about her comment as he should’ve been.

”I— _what—_ that’s so uncalled for!” Lance spluttered, his blush burning permanent to his face.

” _Pidge,_ ” Shiro chastised and then promptly went silent, probably falling into a deep regret of whatever decision nudged his life into this moment.

”I don’t know what that is supposed to refer to,” Allura said, a hopeful tone to her sentence, as if she wanted someone to respond with an explanation—to Lance’s complete mortification. What is this? Repeatedly-kick-on-Lance-while-he’s-down hours? He was almost 100% certain Keith would be the one coming forth with the killing blow, but the comm remained relatively silent. Pidge chuckled her evil chuckle, Hunk made yet another half-assed noise of sympathy, and Keith was suspiciously not responding at all.

It all ended with Shiro sighing heavily over the comm link.

”It’s nothing… Trust me, princess. You really don’t want to know,” he said and it carried some kind of authorized finality to the conversation.

”Alright, then,” Allura said after a few seconds of silent resignation, which did nothing to stop her from going back to pick up the original topic of discussion. ”Well, it’ll only be a few minutes until we land on Aegis, so be prepared. You know the drill by now, me and Coran will stay in the castle in orbit while you handle the situation on the ground. The General will have sent someone to bring you to her. Do not disappoint me, paladins. I have trained you in diplomacy for too long for this to turn into a disaster.”

Lance could feel her words pointed at him and Keith as if it was her sharp fingers poking him directly in the chest. Which was completely unfair, since it was Pidge who totally ruined their professional atmosphere just now, and Lance would really like it to be stated on the record that Keith and him are _buddies_ again _._ Everything was absolutely fine between them. No issues. Cool beans. And if Keith happened to be extremely pretty and distracting and completely unavailable, then that was none of Allura’s business—and _certainly_ not Lance’s.

Lance huffed weakly in protest and plopped down back into his chair.

The lull in the conversation seemed to stay after that, so Lance had no other choice but to aim his attention towards the vastness of space through the windshield, at that tiny dot of light that wasn’t as tiny as it was a few minutes ago. It had been a long few hours stuck in Blue, but now they’re finally getting to the action, which Lance found incredibly ironic. The only reason why the paladin’s had been stranded in their lions the whole trip instead of chilling back in the castle was because Allura and Coran were sure this trip would be one of the most dangerous missions they’ve encountered thus far. Weird space creatures and intergalactic phenomenon with a hint of galra troops was surely about to get served, but, you know, that wasn’t at all what happened. In fact, nothing at _all_ happened, except for Lance occasionally dropping passive aggressive comments about not trusting 10.000 year old unreliable information throughout the majority of the journey, but even that got old after a while.

Finally being close enough, Lance narrowed his eyes and managed to work out the dark shape of the single planet orbiting the star (and it’s tiny little purple star friend loyally trailing behind it) ahead. The closer they got the more characteristics he picked up about Aegis, a red planet, slightly smaller than Earth, surprisingly similar to Mars. Suddenly the eight hour road trip— _void trip?_ —came to an end, just like that, as Shiro’s voice echoed through the comm of their lions, instructions and commands leaving his mouth just as smoothly as leadership would come for a guy like him.

They had barely managed to breach Aegis atmosphere and flied right into bright red, angry clouds when Lance froze at the sight of the terrain. A tiny, disappointed sound fumbled its way through his lips before he squashed them into a firm line. While Aegis was far from Earth, it was still a terrestrial planet, Lance knew that. Allura was particularly excited about taking the team here just for that reason. _It has oxygen and water, and the core is very similar to Earth,_ she’d gushed, unusually informal throughout the whole briefing, _the biggest difference is of course the disposition of land and water, but we’ll be landing in the eastern hemisphere where the majority of landmasses are located._ And now as Lance laid his eyes on the planet and took in the view of the seemingly endless map of land beneath them, he thought he finally grasped her meaning. About half of Aegis was made up of land, the other half is where the ocean lies.

”Alright, team. Prepare for landing,” Shiro said and Lance couldn’t help sighing once again in disappointment, earning himself a snarky response to cheer up from Pidge in return. He concentrated on shutting up after that, on not being as much of a bother as they descended from the sky.

_Never a bother_ , Blue’s encompassing voice urged through his mind, and Lance selfishly let her fill him up with her own special brand of warmth.

_I know_ , he responded.

Blue didn’t communicate again for the rest of the landing, but kept pushing her mental embraces his way as if she already knew he wasn’t sure if that was a lie or not.

The cockpit rattled slightly as Blue’s feet touched the ground, and then they’d all landed—the whole ordeal looking like some kind of doomsday prophesy from below probably, if you were a witness uninformed about their arrival. Lance closed his eyes and allowed himself a few moments to breathe. _Mama would have been so proud of me now_ , he thought and gathered all his strength to pull through, imagined an alternate universe in which he’d just landed on Earth. A whole crowd gathered to welcome home the long lost students of the Garrison, now world renown Paladins of Voltron, Defenders of the Universe. His family in the front row, watching as he steps out onto the ramped platform right outside of Blue’s mouth.

_Look at me, ma’, I made it._

Lance got out of his pilot chair and brought down the visor of his helmet until it casted his face in a subtle shadow, and then he walked towards the exit. Blue opened her mouth and smothered him in a mix of concern and encouragement as he stepped out onto the ground, exposing her paladin to the howling wind and gravel trickling over his armor.

Aegis was nothing short of beautiful, Lance couldn’t deny that, but it was beautiful in the way an aposematic snake is before it digs its fangs into your shin. It’s quite alarming. Here, the sand was red, and the sky was red (or more like a soft reddish-orange, but still much too red than a sky has any right to be), and the weeds, and the dirt, and whatever material these box looking buildings are made of. It was all red. Beautiful, but scorched. Dried up. Dying.

_Blue is so much prettier_ , he thought bitterly, but his eyes betrayed him and caught up with the Red Paladin as he emerged from his lion, as if to flaunt how obviously wrong Lance was. Keith crossed his path, glanced back at him in passing, eyebrows furrowed, and then he looked away as if Lance was just a movement in the corner of his eye—catching his interest and losing it just as quickly.

Lance sighed for a third, last time and made his way after him.

They were all headed for a platform further out in front of them, and waiting on it stood a—a _person_? _Hold up_ , Lance thought and squinted. He counted two legs, two arms, okay, so far so good, and they were just slightly taller than the average human would be, and… uh, skin tone reminiscing of a camp fire, almost glistening, so… person- _esque_ at least? Lance didn’t know if it qualified as déjà vu to see an alien species looking so much like a human he almost mistakes it for one at first, but it totally was.

Shiro was the first one of them to reach the platform, Hunk and Pidge coming up right behind him. The alien took a few steps to greet them and offered their hand to Shiro who, pleasantry surprised, offered his hand in return—only to recoil in the last second before their hands met. Lance would have been too far away to hear it, but since he decided to put on his helmet back in Blue the comm attempted to translate the alien language into that annoying, nails-dragging-down-a-chalkboard noise like the one before. A violent wince rippled through his body as Lance tore off his helmet, an automatic response to the shrill noise piercing through his head. Keith, who’d walked only a step or two in front of him, completely keeled over at the sound coming out of the alien’s mouth, and even through the ringing in his ears Lance instinctively grabbed a hold of him to stop him from completely smashing his face to the ground.

” _Oh_ , I am so very sorry,” Lance heard the alien say from afar, in a subdued, apologetic English this time. His eyes stayed glued on Keith though, onto the pained tilt to his eyebrows, the convulsing of his limbs, to his hands pawing at his helmet to get it off.

” _Keith_ ,” Lance breathed, as Keith didn’t immediately get back up. Lance clutched onto his fingers and pried them off his helmet and helped him get it off instead. ”Hey—it’s okay, it’s over,” he soothed, holding Keith tighter and pulling him up from his crouched position on the ground. Keith nodded his head up and down, as if in a daze, taking an extra moment before he slowly opened his eyes, gaze landing somewhere beneath Lance’s chin—and he realized suddenly _exactly_ how close they were standing, chest to chest, fingers intertwined, facing each other with approximately _zero_ inches between their armor.

_Déjà vu,_ Lance confirmed.

Keith stayed right where he was, eyebrows still twisted in that awful way Lance never wanted to see on him again. A bead of sweat trickled down the side of his face, and then Keith looked up directly at him. Lance gulped.

”You okay?” he said, tried his damn hardest not to sound too soft, too concerned. Keith nodded again, freeing one hand from Lance’s grip and combing a few strands of hair plastered to his forehead away behind his ear, but Lance saw the way his fingers kneaded into his head as if a lingering pain remained there. ”You sure about that, buddy? It’s fine if you’re not.” Lance couldn’t help but prod, not when the sight of Keith collapsing in pain still flashed through his mind like a scratchy dvd stuck on repeat. Keith’s eyes widened, as if he just came to realize where they were and what just happened, a frenzied shake of his head came directly after and showered Lance in the red gravel caught in his hair.

”I’m _fine_ ,” Keith snapped and took a shaky step backwards, and Lance guessed he’d successfully ruined the uncharacteristically meek state Keith found himself in.

He was stuck in this way-too-close position however, right hand still slightly stretched out since it was caught in the hold Keith had of it. Keith seemed to notice the way they were holding on to each other at the same time as Lance, his eyes flickering down to their intertwined fingers and back up at him again, and immediately ripped his hand away, as if he’d accidentally touched something _particularly_ slimy and disgusting. Lance brought his own hand up to his chest.

_Ouch_.

”You guys okay?” Hunk’s worried tone carried across the distance. With a look over Keith’s shoulder Lance found the others watching them with varying degrees of concern on their faces. He caught the way Keith froze at the attention immediately, a fatal allergy to any kind of concern for his being, and steeled himself with a deep breath, slung an arm casually across Keith’s shoulders and turned them towards the team.

” _Peachy_ ,” Lance shouted back to the team, a wide smirk on his face, ”that noise could’ve been a bop back home, Hunk—an absolute _banger_ , I tell you—it could win Grammy’s _,_ ” he waved his free hand in the air and ended his spiel with a light chuckle, ” _plural_!”

Hunk cracked up at his antics, Pidge jumped into the conversation with a few of her own even more absurd statements and Shiro smiled all crookedly and turned back towards the bewildered alien. The crisis successfully averted. Keith’s entire body deflated beneath Lance’s arm, pressing closer, almost unconsciously—if Lance were to guess, that is. Lance tilted his head down to watch the way Keith’s shoulders both sagged and flexed rigidly, and noticed his eyes strictly staring ahead and avoiding to look up at Lance. Something solid densified between the intricate hold of their limbs, and Lance couldn't understand how they could be this close and still have an entire brick wall separating them.

Keith closed his eyes, yet another barrier, and exhaled.

”Thanks.”

The word came fleetingly, a peace offering, a pair of feet standing outside of Lance’s front door without knocking. Lance opened his mouth and silently stuttered at the unexpected gratitude.

”It’s cool,” he ended up saying, super casual. _It’s chill, no big deal,_ he wanted to add, for good measure. Like, he only got to hold Keith cradled to his chest—absolutely _peachy,_ indeed _._ ”You okay to walk?” he asked instead of blabbering about exactly how wide Keith’s shoulders felt enclosed within his hold like this.

”Yeah, I’m fine,” Keith said, voice like rumbling gravel, limbs quivering like a leaf, every part of him raw as nature before a natural disaster, and Lance wasn’t sure if Keith’s ever really learned the true meaning of being fine.

”Sure, cool, no problem,” Lance said, let his arm fling off Keith’s shoulders and brought it up to rub at his neck, desperately looking towards the others only to miraculously be delivered the next cue. Over by the platform Shiro descended into some kind of hatch opening and Pidge turned to wave at them impatiently to hurry up. ”Oh, look at that,” Lance urged, ”seems like everybody’s heading inside!”

Keith gave Lance a weird look, but nodded as they headed over to follow the rest of the team down the hatch. At the platform they stepped right down a disturbingly narrow staircase. They only went down enough steps for a thick metal door to open up for the alien, letting them all into a turbid, yet futuristic looking hallway. It was well lit and clean, although the rust tinted fluorescent lighting shining down on them from the low ceilings and the thick cords lining the walls made it feel a bit more cluttered than it really was. It was kind of refreshing in a way, compared to the sleek, minimalistic altean kind of decor and technology.

”Woah,” Hunk said, head going in circles to take in the intricate tech of the place. Pidge touched the wall, fingers grazing over several tied together wires of various colors as she walked next to him and looked just as in awe as Hunk.

”Welcome to Atenea One,” the alien spoke up ahead of them, their voice reverberating through the hallway, and gestured for them all to step into a cylindrical, capsule shaped elevator, the rounded ceiling lighting up the inside of it, shining eerily down on them as if they were strapped to an operation table. Lance barely managed to settle inside before the elevator door swooshed closed behind him, and shivers spread across his body as the temperature dropped several degrees. _Jesus, the cold really clashes with all the red,_ he thought and brought his hands up to rub some warmth into his skin.

”I feel like I’m in a Star Wars movie or something,” Lance mumbled with unease, not really intending to be heard by anyone, but Keith still huffed and settled next to Lance in the elevator. He stood a foot away, with his arms crossed and eyebrows furrowed over his eyes in that permanent frown of his.

”More like Men in Black,” he argued and Lance really couldn’t help the tiny smile from spreading from the corners of his mouth.

Though Keith was absolutely, objectively _wrong_ in his statement, Lance didn’t feel the usual need to tell him that. He was just happy that Keith was voluntarily talking to him.

It was still a bit tense between them, and had been for a couple of weeks at least, but this time it was _totally_ because of whatever just happened up there on the surface. More than anything Lance wished he could just ask how Keith was doing, if he felt fine now, if he was also still hearing that annoying whistling noise that hadn’t left Lance’s eardrums since they entered this hidden facility—but how would he even begin that sentence without getting faced with a Keith that clamps down on his jaws so hard Lance’s afraid he’ll shatter his own teeth someday?

”I suppose some of you probably didn’t hear me earlier,” the alien said again, interrupting Lance’s internal struggle, as the elevator took them several floors down. ”You may refer to me as Lieutenant Eermes, and I will be your guide for your stay here on Aegis. I am terribly sorry for my awful introduction, greeting our guests in our native language is an ancient tradition, but I do acknowledge the harm I caused you. General Aelix mentioned you wouldn’t understand our language, although the severe consequences of it didn’t exactly come across.” Here, Eermes paused and let their eyes stray over to Keith briefly, for one heavy second, and then they moved on. ”It is with the utmost respect and sincere need of assistance that she has asked of you to aid us in the situation we’re in. I hope you are not too offended to continue our tour.”

”Don’t worry, there was no lasting harm,” Shiro responded and tilted his head down slightly. Lance frowned and pointedly glanced over at Keith, who was squinting in the bright light of the elevator as if it hurt to keep his eyes open. ”We’ll still do our best to help Aegis and its people, of course, although,” Shiro hesitated, formulating his sentence in his head before speaking, ”if you could refrain from using your native language around us, especially while wearing our helmets, that would facilitate our stay greatly.”

”Aegis?” Eermes questioned immediately. Shiro smiled politely, something that always worked to reassure and calm down foreign royalty and rulers, and explained the situation of not being able to translate the name of the planet directly. Eermes nodded along and started smiling back while Shiro told them the meaning of Aegis. ”I see. Well, about our language, I noticed it doesn’t exactly… translate well through those comms of yours. I’ll let it be known, there is no need for you to worry.”

”Thank you, that is going to make this all much easier.” Shiro bowed his head, and so the main problem was handled.

”I’m glad,” Eermes said, and then the elevator doors opened, blinding them as the bright, red-ish light from outside shined upon on them. Eermes took a step out of the capsule as if the light wasn’t currently burning the eye lenses of the rest of them. Shiro and the Paladins followed, albeit on a bit unsteady legs. ”This is the facility in which our people will stay when the time comes for the Great Wave,” they continued and Lance’s eyebrows flied up his forehead.

”The great _what_ now?” he questioned, voice breaking in a squeaky endnote and all. He remembered Allura telling him about the other water clad half of the planet, quite unsettled by the implications. Eermes turned towards him briefly to acknowledge his question, but didn’t bother to slow down their urgent tour through the building.

”The _Great Wav_ e, Blue Paladin,” they responded, and Lance can’t really say he got any wiser from the answer.

”Uh, and what exactly is the Great Wave?” Hunk questioned as well from the back of the group, his interest suddenly switching from the rustic design of the hallways to the actual conversation at hand. Eermes gestured them to walk through some kind of airshaft and into yet another elevator before responding. Only when they all settled and the elevator brought them up this time did they turn to look at Hunk.

”The Great Wave is the death and rebirth of our world,” they explained, sounding a bit too calm and collected for Lance’s tastes. Lance and Hunk shared a look when they didn’t continue with any type of explanation.

”Oh, alrighty then,” Hunk gulped, nodding along as if that had cleared everything right up.

”Do not worry, Yellow Paladin, this will all be explained to you by General Aelix,” Eermes reassured, and Hunk seemed to at least relax enough to start checking out the many options on the elevator touchscreen with Pidge.

The elevator doors opened up again, this time to the sight of two other aliens, both clad in military uniforms much like the alien that led them there. Eermes lowered their head in greeting as they stepped out of the elevator platform, the other two aliens doing the same, not raising their heads even after they walked towards them. Lance caught his eyes straying on one of the aliens, a guard of some sorts, probably not in any of the high military rankings if Lance were to guess. The alien’s skin shifted in a subtle orange to lilac across their face, the darkest of patches across the nose and cheeks, similar to Eermes who’s skin seemed to shimmer in the same warm tones. Just as Lance were to pass the guard, the alien looked up, dark eyes latched onto something right above Lance’s shoulder, and their face lit up in a hundred sparkly dots across the face. Lance furrowed his brows and the alien finally flickered their eyes to him, as if suddenly noticing someone standing right in front of them. The whole ordeal only went on for a fraction of a second, but both Lance and the alien gasped all the same at being caught right in the act of staring. The alien’s deep maroon eyes widened in surprise before they promptly looked down again, going back to standing in their post just like before.

”General Aelix is waiting for us in the observation control center,” Eermes explained and showed the way through the hallway. Lance shrugged off the weird moment with the guard and fell into step with Keith who suddenly appeared at his side, and gave him his very best grin as they moved along. Keith immediately turned his gaze somewhere else as if Lance hadn’t just caught him looking, but stayed close, enough for their elbows to knock into each other.

They walked like that through several more thick metal doors, the majority of them demanding hand prints and eye scans to get through. Finally Eermes turned around and signaled the team to stop in front of one last metal door, bringing their palms together to catch their attention—Pidge’s in particular as she still lingered a few steps behind by the last door they went through, too caught up with the high tech security systems. Eermes waited patiently until Pidge scuttled her way next to Shiro, head tilted down to avoid their piercing glare, and then Eermes put their hand onto the little screen on the wall and the doors swooshed open.

”The Paladins of Voltron,” they introduced them loudly in English, bringing all the eyes of the room to the team as they entered. It was obvious that they had just entered the observation control center, when along with the many aliens with official military gear, they also faced an infinite amount of screens, keyboards and other advanced tech devises that Lance had no idea what to call. He turned and caught the sight of the door closing behind them, only to face even more desks with big ass screens and aliens with communicating gear, talking into microphones and pressing important-looking buttons further into the room that seemed to bend and continue behind the back corner. ”This is where we will have most of our briefings and tactical meetings about Aegis and our situation—and _this_ is General Aelix.”

”Thank you, Lieutenant Eermes,” a light voice greeted Eermes back in just as fluent English—an _affinity_ for learning foreign languages, Coran had said. Lance whipped around, saw Eermes murmuring into the ear of another aegian further into the room, and almost knocked into Keith that still stood by his side. Fortunately, Keith managed to grab him by the arm to stop him from tripping over his own feet and making a fool of himself in front of the General. He gave Lance a wide eyed look and shook his head discretely, like it was Lance’s fault that Keith was standing so close. Lance huffed and shrugged the hand off of his arm before bringing his eyes up at the tall alien who’s voice caught all their attention.

”Paladins of Voltron,” she said, halting them all by the obvious authority in her every word, despite the soft spoken vowels and light pitch of her voice. Lance straightened his back as her striking emerald eyes swept over him, whiplashed by the sudden flashbacks of his abuela scolding him for picking fights with his siblings. ”I am Aelix, General of the Army. Aegis and all of her citizens welcome you,” she continued, a teeth revealing smile spreading across her lips. She was tall, even taller than Shiro, with heavy armor cladding her body, smudges of red dirt scattered all across as if she’d just been out on the field. Her dark plum-purple complexion stood out compared to most of the other aliens’ fiery colors in the room. Long, seaweed colored hair fell in braids over her shoulders, the ones around her forehead tied up in a thick knot at the crown of her head.

”Thank you, General Aelix.” Shiro bowed his head in a respectful greeting, the rest of the team following in tow. ”Voltron exists solely to help anyone who needs it, and we’ve gathered from your distress beacon that you are in need of our aid.”

General Aelix closed her mouth, even though a slight grin remained.

”Indeed,” she nodded, and with that she turned and gestured towards a big screen showcasing coordinates of the galaxy not far from Aegis. ”Galra vessels have been spotted circling only a few stars from here, and it is of great concern for my people considering the move underground.” Pidge treaded closer to assess the information on the screen, pushing up her glasses over her nose with her finger. The general glanced over at her fleetingly—though Lance couldn’t help feeling that she was far more assertive than she let on—but didn’t say anything about Pidge’s bold curiousness. She simply directed her attention back towards the screen, to the grainy pictures taken of the galra ships in a distance, eyebrows furrowed. ”They know we are here, but they have yet to act on it. We fear they are planning to attack us at our most vulnerable state when the Great Wave hits.”

”Sorry, general Aelix, sir, uh, _ma’am—_ general ma’am Aelix—”

”General Aelix is quite alright, Yellow Paladin.” The general smiled at Hunk, mirth in her eyes, and Hunk blushed at the correction.

”Yes, uh, General Aelix, sorry, but I just wondered if you could explain what this Great Wave is and why it would make you so vulnerable and, uh, you know, what you mean about the moving underground thing.” Hunk mimicked Shiro’s polite bow of his head, tapping his pointy fingers against each other in a nervous tick.

”Gladly,” General Aelix said and nodded her head back in a respectful gesture, and then made sure to meet every single one of the paladins’ gazes. Lance gulped at the attention, how it blinded him like a spotlight, until her eyes traveled to the next person. ”From what we know right now Aegis will flood in only a few weeks, as it has done every thousand years since the dawn of the planet. This, paladins, is what we call the Great Wave, the cleansing, the death and rebirth of our world.”

”How long will it stay flooded, general?” Shiro asked, his features drawn into a concerned frown.

”Days. One week perhaps. We are not sure—most of our knowledge of the previous Great Wave was destroyed by the galra when they tried to overtake our planet a few centuries ago, or it got wiped out as time has gone by. We are keeping track of the aegian crust and hurricane activity in the southwest, and of course preparing to move our citizens underground into facilities like this. We have built 30 underground cities in total, and they will all house up to one billion aegians. What we need is for you, the Paladins of Voltron, to guard us in these times of commute and help our people safely get underground before the Great Wave—before the galra attacks—” the general took a breath, turning around to look up at the looming screen of galra Vessels, too close to home to be comfortable ”—and they will attack, I can assure you of that.”

The solemn silence fell upon the room until the general cleared her throat and gestured for another alien to press something onto the big screen. Suddenly the picture of the galra vessels changed into some kind of intricate blueprint of a W shaped facility. Hunk’s delightful gasp could be heard across the whole room. On the screen, two sections of the building went straight down underground only to turn and go halfway up again and meet in the middle. Lance frowned at the complex floor plans and scaled down hallways in front of him—it looked like the single most frustrating maze he’d ever seen.

”This is where we stand right now, in Atenea One,” she explained, pointing towards a room in the middle of the W, and backed a few steps to let them fully view the blueprint. ”This middle section is the housing quarters where our people will live, as well as the controls room where we will keep track of the Great Wave and when it’s safe to breach surface again.” The middle part of the W turned into a shade of green on the screen, while the two sides turned red. ”The flanks are the only two ways up and will be sealed when the water comes. We have built it this way to make sure our people will be safe in the higher middle part—if the water breaks through one of the flanks then it won’t be able to reach the middle sections,” she explained and guided their eyes through the complicated map of the place, which was much bigger than Lance could have ever imagined. He remembered the long elevator ride down, the infinite hallways and thousands of doors sealed with high tech security, the airshaft and the elevator ride back up again—it truly was an underground city.

”How long has this been in the works?” Pidge asked, her glasses flashing ominously in the sheen from the screen in front of them.

”A couple of hundred years—my grandmother was one of the first architects to sketch the modern blueprints of this place,” General Aelix answered with a smirk.

Lance’s eyebrows shot up on his forehead. _Grandmother?_ he mouthed towards Keith who definitely didn’t know enough about aegians to dispute it, and got a frown and shrug as response. Lance frowned back at him, still trying to figure out how general Aelix grandmother could have been alive a couple of hundred years ago.

”Healthy aegians can live up to one hundred and fifty years,” Lieutenant Eermes informed them quickly, before a real squabble could occur.

”The airshafts will close when the Great Wave hits,” the general continued, this time showing another blueprint picture on the screen of the mechanics of the high tech security doors they went through to get here. ”As soon as they detect the vibrations in the ground we have thirty minutes to get any last latecomers down in Atenea. All the doors in the red sectors will close—and these doors are made to hold up the pressure of our ocean, once they’re sealed to the floor there’s no way to open them. Ideally, this won’t be a problem and all the citizens will already be eased into Atenea and found their temporary homes.”

A shiver prickled down Lance’s spine. Just the thought of getting stuck outside one of those heavy metal doors when the Great Wave came was enough to make him snap out of his teasing-Keith-mood and focus on the blueprints. Drowning behind a closed door was never really the kind of death he’d imagined for himself, especially after being claimed by Blue and by default becoming the Paladin of Water, the irony of that too on the nose, even for him. No, Lance had imagined his death being a bit more heroic. Saving someone. Sacrificing himself. Space explosions and war cries. That kind of junk.

”Now, I’d love to show you our city,” general Aelix said, eyes lighting up, and clapped her hands together. ”You’ve seen Atenea, but not our capital. Lieutenant Eermes, if you will?”

Their guide, Eermes, immediately stepped forth at the general’s call.

”Of course,” they said and gestured for the paladins to follow them back through the entrance and going all the way back to the elevator, taking it several floors down, and then they continued in the opposite direction of the elevator than the one they took to get there. Lance fell into step next to Keith again in the back of the group as they moved through endless of these crude hallways. General Aelix coming along in the rear right behind them.

Lance turned his head as he passed a roughly carved out hatch opening in the wall, overflowing with wires and screens and various tech stuff that he had absolutely no idea what to call. It bizarrely reminded him of a carved up body with its intestines hanging out. He’d practically started walking backwards to really ogle the rather unsafe display when he accidentally met the amused eyes of the general.

”Uh—” was all he got to say before backing right into Keith, and _Jesus Christ_ , how many times are they going to knock into each other before it turns into a pattern?

” _Lance_ ,” Keith groaned and rubbed the back of his head all adorably while glaring at him.

A very _indulging_ pattern.

”Don’t blame him, Red Paladin,” General Aelix spoke up suddenly, ushering them gently to keep moving. ”As much as I’d like to say otherwise, Atenea One isn’t quite as finished as we would have liked by now.”

” _Uh_ ,” Lance said, alarmed this time.

”Oh, do not worry. It is completely safe to stay down here, it’s just the finer decorative details that are lacking I’m afraid,” she explained and shrugged towards the cluttered walls and the exposed pipes and ventilation systems. Lance nodded gravely. It was definitely impressive that they had built over thirty underground cities, but it sure wasn’t pretty. ”These hallways are actually part of an old underground building that used to function as an emergency bunker in the old times,” the general continued as Lieutenant Eermes guided them down a stairwell and through an even rougher looking hallway. ”Aegians have always sought shelter underground during the Great Wave, but since the population only continues to grow and the war hasn’t seemed to come to an end we had to rebuild the whole thing to accommodate our peoples needs. We decided to keep these old parts of the building as to not forget our history since so much of it has been wiped out by the galra already.”

General Aelix let her fingertips touch the walls reverently as they walked, much like Pidge had when they first arrived—although with less wonder and excitement and something closer akin to the pondering of flickering car headlights peering over the edge of a cliff in the the night, unable to reach the secrets that hides at the bottom.

”Your grandmother designed this?” Lance asked curiously.

”Only the modern parts of Atenea,” she explained, pulling her hand away from the wall. ”These hallways have been here for millennia, long before the galra began their incessant overthrowing of the universe.”

Keith walked past Lance and the general and up towards the doorframe of one of those metal doors, hands grazing over the intricate mechanism that would keep them alive as the Great Wave hits. Lance shivered at the thought. 

”Over that door right there is actually a secret chute that the ancient aegians used to get to safety from invasions, and the Great Wave of course,” General Aelix said and gestured to the doorframe above Keith. Lance looked up and saw the square hatch of a secret opening, about two feet in width. He blew out a long whistle.

”Does it work?” Keith asked, head tilted all the way back from his spot right beneath it.

”We haven’t done anything to block it, if that’s what you mean, but we haven’t exactly counted on it to be a functioning evacuation spot for our people either. It was meant for a time when there were only a few hundred citizens on the surface, and the majority living underground. It leads to a street pretty close to the main evacuation spot to Atenea One though, so we might have to try it out just to see if it’s good enough to use, just in case,” she explained, grinning cheekily as if they were all sharing a secret.

Keith glanced over at Lance, a playful grin on his lips as if he was just as excited as Lance was about trying out an ancient slide into a hidden underground city.

”Well, enough with the fun, Paladins,” the general said then, suddenly, and Keith whipped his head around towards her at the airy voice echoing through the hallways, ”we should get going before we lose the group.”

They continued walking, could hear the voices of the team further ahead, went down yet another narrow stairwell, through another door until they caught up with them.

”Jesus, if you’d left us waiting any longer we’d already have drowned in the Great Wave,” Pidge muttered as they all fitted themselves into the elevator that stood waiting for them.

” _Pidge_ ,” Shiro scolded, a sharp bump of his elbow to her armor.

The elevator ride up was almost twice as long as the one they took to get down in the beginning. It got them all wondering how far down they’d really been, how far these tunnels and hallways ran, how the heck the aegians had managed to build this thousands and thousands of years ago. The air inside the elevator felt intrusive. History crashing into them from all directions and Lance didn’t know if he was worthy of it all. How could he save a civilization that has survived and thrived for longer than Earth has existed?

Lance was just about to start nervously agonize Keith again when the elevator doors suddenly opened, and a different kind of light—a brighter, clear kind—poured in through the opening. Lance stepped out, a breath pulled into his chest almost by itself, as if his lungs hadn’t tasted anything like this since they went down the first pair of stairs. Ahead of them was an oval shaped room with walls completely made of glass, for as far as his eye could reach he saw the exuberant city spreading out beneath them, a patchwork of buildings and intertwining streets that kept it all together.

”Holy shit,” he breathed. Lance wanted to shove his face into the glass. He wanted to fly.

The general walked passed him, a dimmed silhouette that turned to face them.

”This is what we call the Watchtower—and this, Paladins of Voltron, is Zoira,” she said, arm gesturing out towards the window, ”the capital of Aegis.”

The rest of the team all stepped out of the elevator and walked until they could see Zoira properly. Far below on the ground it swarmed; all narrow, busy streets and low buildings, wonky corners and warm, earthy colors splattered in uncoordinated patterns.

”Aegians are a peaceful kind of people,” she continued, pleased of their awestruck faces. ”We want to thrive like any other species, we want happiness and fulfilling lives, and the way to get that is through wanting the best for our fellow beings, both aegian and intergalactic. This is what we have been fighting for all along—to end Zarkon's tyranny and bring back freedom to all creatures in the universe. We will gladly join your coalition,” she continued, and by now the other paladins had all turned back to look at her, saw the down tilt of her brows, the sincerity in her expression, ”and we will do so even if you chose not to help us during these trying times.”

”Why?” Lance found himself asking, ripping his entranced gaze away from the city, and gained the potent attention of both the general and lieutenant. The team gave him wide eyed looks; Shiro shook his head slowly, Pidge dropped her chin and Hunk tapped his fingers together nervously, all of them silently berating him for his rudeness—except for Keith, who only looked at him for a short second before bringing his narrowed eyes back to the aegians, ever so suspicious.

Shiro cleared his throat to end the tense silence.

”I apologize, General, what I think Lance means is—” Shiro began, only for Keith to take a step forwards, effectively interrupting him.

”What Lance means is _why—_ if you would have joined the coalition anyway, why would you bring us down here to test us like this?” His voice was harsh, like it always was, mostly, but this time Lance thought is was completely warranted. The aegians had been great hosts so far, but Lance was not even close to forgetting Keith’s pained expression, his crumbling body on the ground, nails scratching the area around his ears as if he could escape the sound of Lieutenant Eermes’ voice by ripping it off his skin.

Lance couldn’t recall Lieutenant Eermes ever informing the rest of the aegians about the issue of their language. How did they all know to speak perfect English unless they had planned it from the very beginning?

Lieutenant Eermes opened their mouth to speak but was stopped by a palm raised in front of them. Lance’s eyes trailed the arm and landed back on the general. She dropped her hand slowly, pursed her mouth in consideration, looked at Keith as if he just passed the test he’d mentioned earlier.

”You are both right,” she said, finally, an invisible veil dropped between them. ”You have all the reasons to question us, and I encourage you to do so.”

”Then why?” Shiro spoke up again, in a stoic voice that had Lance's shoulders relaxing, although he hadn’t even noticed that he had been this tense to begin with. The general smiled, a small tilt to her mouth, chin raised as if to appear taller.

”Simple,” she said. ”We need your help, with the galra threat and the Great Wave coming sooner rather than later, we really do—but we have all the reasons to question you as well, paladins. No one has heard or seen anything of Voltron for ten thousand years, and then suddenly Princess Allura answers our distress call, claiming to be altean and in affiliation with Voltron. I think we have the right to be suspicious.”

Lance nodded. It made sense.

Keith remained standing just a slight step in front of him, a brick wall between Lance and the aegians.

”That’s fair,” Hunk said and offered a rueful smile.

”Yes,” the general said and smiled back towards him, voice several shades warmer, ”but I have found your visit to be highly enlightening, and if you are as honorable as your reputation precedes you to be, I hope you will help us without holding the promise of joining the coalition over our heads.”

”We will help you, not because fair is fair, but because it’s the right thing to do,” Shiro responded. The general turned her gaze to him and nodded.

And just like that, the tense atmosphere evaporated.

Lieutenant Eermes suggested they continue the tour, with Pidge agreeing and marching through another exit next to the elevator before they even managed to end their sentence. The team trailed along with the general who narrated the place and history of the city as they went.

Lance took one step to follow, but faltered once again at the panorama windows, at the breathtaking sight of the city sprouting up from far, far beneath him, spreading out even over the horizon. It was like looking at Luis playing with his infinite collection of Lego back at home, poured out on the floor in his room, the way he’d start by strategically putting them down and organize them into intricate rows and patterns, building tiny houses in all possible colors, telling Lance off with flailing arms for stepping too close— _Go away, gigante! You’ll ruin it!_ —and Lance remembered being so impressed by his little brother; by the dynamic architecture, the focus and the creativity that went into designing the Lego city infrastructure. It looked alive. It looked like it was _moving_.

Luis would’ve been thrilled to see Zoira, it wouldn’t matter that it’s an alien city on a planet far away from home. That the streets are a bit too crooked, the color spectrum a bit too off.

_That’s what makes it so special,_ Luis told him once when Lance had commented on the weird shape of the houses he’d built, _it’s supposed to be different—if everything looked exactly like home, then how would you ever find your way back?_

Lance pulled in a sharp breath and shook his head to dispel the memories, but he supposed Luis was right. Like he usually was. He always was the smart one in the family, compared to his other dumbass siblings.

Lance looked away from the view outside and turned to join the others for the rest of the tour and was surprised to see Keith leaning against the wall, waiting for him. Lance froze, tried to sort through his expressions to find the right one that would quell down the worried wrinkle between Keith’s brows.

”You okay?” Keith asked, finally, after too many seconds of silence, and took a few steps back into the room. Then he stopped suddenly, scratching his elbow, as if realizing he was about to do something he shouldn’t.

”Yeah,” Lance said, lying through his teeth, and yet he couldn’t find the energy to come up with anything more reassuring. He didn’t really feel the usual need to prove himself to Keith, but he still didn’t want him to worry. He wished he could just—just, like, soothe his thumb between his brows, caress the tiny wrinkle away from Keith’s skin. Or something corny like that. Lance settled for a tired smile as he walked towards him, closing the remaining distance that Keith couldn’t breach. Keith didn’t call him out on the lie, but he also didn’t smile back at him, not even when Lance threw his arm around his neck and pulled him closer to follow the tracks of their team.

”Just another planet that’s too similar to home, is all,” Lance said, truthful this time, and Keith actually seemed to accept that, finally relenting to Lance’s nonchalant display. As in his body going all soft and pliant in Lance’s embrace, his head leaning in slightly, just enough for his bangs to tickle Lance’s cheek, and Lance buffered for a second. The fact that the red paladin hadn’t already fractured Lance’s arm in three different places was a miracle in its own. A miracle that Lance certainly was not going to waste.

He glanced at the boy discretely, from the corner of his eyes, and saw that the worried frown still lingered in the downturn of his mouth—and Lance couldn’t have that. He pulled playfully at the tips of Keith’s hair, partly to emphasize how totally not upset he was at the moment, and partly because Keith’s hair was right there in his vicinity, ready to be tugged at. He didn’t realize though that pulling Keith’s hair meant that the guy would turn his head in an agitated glare, because _suddenly_ his face was so, _so_ close, all Lance would have to do was tip forwards just an inch or two and their noses would be touching. A tiny gasp escaped through Keith’s lips, his dark eyes blown wide, and Lance swears to God he’s never fought so hard to not flicker his gaze down to catch the sight of those lips before. But no matter how much Lance’s entire being longed to do something about that ridiculously tiny pocket of space between them, all Lance could do was to offer a rueful smile.

”Kidding,” he said and chuckled, lamely.

Keith’s entire face shut down, quicker than Veronica throwing the door of her room closed back home after a fight with mama.

”Whatever,” Keith mumbled, his eyes darting away and then he escaped entirely from Lance’s hold, leaving his arm to dangle in the place where Keith previously had been. The air surged out of Lance’s lungs, as if he’d gotten punched, and he refused to comprehend the sudden needy feeling that washed over him.

”Wait!” he blurted, too loud considering the short distance Keith had managed to put between them. His voice echoed ominously, bouncing between the blank walls and the huge panorama windows. Keith shrank into his shoulders and looked back at Lance with those huge eyes again. ”I just—” Lance began and then suddenly he couldn’t find the words. He just _what_? He just wanted to kiss him? Once? _Forever_? Nothing good would ever come out of that being said out loud. Keith and his stunted social skills wouldn’t be able to bounce back from that kind of confession. Like, they’re pretty close, definitely on the top chart of best buds on the team… uh, they used to be, at least. Lance can admit that they do have a pretty unstable track record to suggest otherwise—so, definitely not close enough for Lance to believe their friendship could survive an unrequited crush as big as this one.

”They’re probably waiting for us, Lance,” Keith said suddenly, looking straight at him, decidedly not inquiring to know what Lance was about to say—not even a little bit curious. It shut Lance up right away. He clenched his jaws together and stared at Keith, at his feet shifting swiftly as if ready to escape the room, hands hanging stiffly at his sides, his blank features. Never before has he felt so out of reach.

”I know, I just—” Lance shook his head and tried to grasp onto whatever sliver of the mood from before that he could find ”—I just miss home, is all.” The effect the words had on Keith was not as obvious as Lance had hoped. ”I thought this planet was all dirt, but _Zoira_ —it’s beautiful, Keith. It reminds me of the busy streets back home, and Luis and Vivienne—” here Lance abruptly stopped talking. Across from him, Keith had his lips pressed into a firm line, as if physically stopping himself from saying anything he’d regret. Lance closed his mouth as well, falling into the staring match between them easily. At last Keith sighed, breaking their eye contact and taking a step away from Lance.

”This isn’t home,” was all he said, ripping the band-aid off without any warning, like it was nothing. Lance’s lips parted in a soft gasp, barely noticeable, the words hitting him like an inevitable blow to the chest that he should have seen coming from miles away. Keith frowned, and then he treated Lance to the all too familiar sight of his back turning towards him, leaving him to stand alone in the hallway.

”No,” Lance murmured into the vacuum that Keith had left behind, a weight heavier than lead settling on his shoulders, ”it certainly isn’t.”

  
  


_Earth, at the end of an era_

Lance was born only a month after Opportunity— _Oppy_ for short—sent her last message to Earth. _My battery is low and it’s getting dark_ , the Mars rover had said, so utterly human in its simplicity. Lance liked to think about it as an era of space traveling coming to an end, and a new one beginning shortly after.

Oppy’s significant contribution to the research on Mars helped set up the very first man piloted mission to our neighboring red planet by the time Lance had turned five. He watched the ascending rocket on a huge screen, clinging to his mama’s hand along with his older siblings, from the guest area of the launch control room at the John F. Kennedy Space center.

Luis was born eight months after the Ares crew left the atmosphere.

Their dad was the first human in history to set a foot on Mars.

The Galaxy Garrison Program was also launched the summer after Oppy was declared dead, a NASA sponsored Space Camp in memory of the hardworking rover, to help further our knowledge of Mars and entertain the increase of interest in space amongst children because of the upcoming Ares mission. It didn’t take long until Galaxy Garrison, the Summer Space Camp, progressed into a full-fledged flight school for future generations of space explorers with a high-tech campus, renown for its prodigy students (such as Takashi Shirogane).

Lance’s second oldest sibling got in right away, and not because their father had been on the Ares crew and part of the faculty at the Garrison, but because she is smart and resilient. Veronica started off as a communications cadet, but by the time it was Lance’s turn to apply for the Garrison she had quickly raised through the ranks and was a junior officer, with a widespread STEM education in her back pocket. His other siblings didn’t follow the family legacy quite like Veronica and Lance. Rachel, the oldest, was already starting her own family, expecting either a nephew or niece to Lance the same year he decided he wanted to go to the Garrison. The sibling closest in age to Lance—Marco, only a year and a half older—decided he wanted to become a concept artist.

Lance was proud of every single one of his siblings, but while they were busy choosingdifferent paths in life and with Veronica having her interest catching in the science side of space exploration, Lance had only ever found himself wanting to fly. To pilot his own ship. To travel further than any human ever had. He wanted to fill his father’s shoes and walk even longer than he did. He was finally going to show his dad what he’d been missing out on.

But Lance got into the Garrison only to end up as a cargo pilot. Not that it’d mattered anyway.

Veronica was back home for a few weeks of summer vacation, finally catching a break from her research work at the Garrison. She’d decided to come home a week before their father and was supposed to pick him up from the airport in only a few days. That very same week Lance was supposed to receive the letter that told him whether or not he’d get into the Garrison. The excitement and anticipation to show his dad when he got home after so long being away had him sitting practically glued to the wooden porch right outside the front door in wait for the mailman everyday. His dad had told him earlier that summer that he shouldn’t worry, _you belong at the Garrison as much as you belong in the sea, little fish_ , he’d said. Lance had reminded him not to call him little fish anymore, _come on, dad, I’m not 6 years old,_ but he hadn’t seen his dad for a few months, and for a quick second Lance briefly considered the possibility that his own father had forgotten how old Lance was. He was going to turn fourteen in only a few weeks. His English was getting better by the day. He could recount the training drills of the Garrison by memory alone. And do cool tricks on his bike (no one else in middle school knew how to do those tricks—Lance had a lot of bruises and scabs to show off with). Marco had even taught him another pick up line to use on the girls at the Garrison.

_Soon he’ll be home and he’ll see how great I am_ , Lance thought after his dad hung up the phone to go back to work.

Lance sat outside in the dazing heat and waited for the mail to arrive as usual when a black car stopped right by the curb in front of their house. An old white guy dressed in some kind of suit with stripes on the shoulders and medals hanging form his chest came out of the backseat, followed by a pastor—but it’s not the same pastor as the one in Lance’s church, he just recognized the similar white collar thingy around his neck. Lance didn’t move from his seat on the porch, only raising an eyebrow at the strange men walking towards him.

”Who are you?” he’d asked, the old white guy looked at him weirdly, eyes red, mouth quivering, and Lance didn’t think he’d ever seen another man cry besides his tío and his brothers before that.

”Leandro?” the man said, and butchered his name exactly like the red-burned yumas hanging around the beach. Lance tilted his head suspiciously.

”Your name is Leandro also?” he’d asked in English this time, confused about the foreigner with a name like his that he couldn’t even pronounce. The man frowned, his eyebrows so tightly pinched together Lance thought they had grown like that for a second.

”No—no, my name is Leif. You probably don’t remember me, but I met you when you were very little,” he said, getting down on one knee in front of Lance and smiled kindly. Lance didn’t smile back. ”God, you look _just_ like him—you’ve grown so much,” the man continued, voice wobbly and thick. Lance thought he was definitely too big now to really care about stranger danger, but his mama would kill him if he started chatting with foreign men who claimed they knew him as a baby.

”Why are you here?” he asked instead, because he was curious, but he barely had the time to finish the question before a sob shattered the man’s calm exterior, to Lance’s utter bewilderment. This Leif guy quickly brought a hand up to his face to hide the fresh stream of tears trailing down his cheeks. The pastor took a step forwards to lay a hand on his shoulder and muttered something Lance couldn’t hear.

”Uh— _mamá_ ,” Lance shouted in alarm and scrambled backwards on the porch until his back hit the front of his mama’s legs, suddenly appearing as if evoked from Lance’s thoughts. Lance tilted his head backwards until he caught sight of his mama from this odd upside down angle, but she wasn’t looking back at him.

”Maria,” the man said, and got up from his kneeling position on the ground, brushing off the dirt from his pants before clenching his hands into white knuckled fists at his sides.

”Leif? What are you doing here?” she asked, voice light as a feather. Lance had never heard her sounding like that before. Not even those times when no one had heard from his dad in weeks and she’d been really sad.

Lance’s eyes flickered between his mother and this Leif guy, wondering who he is and why the sight of him makes his mama behave so weird.

”I—” Leif started, but broke off in another sob, took a staggering step up onto the first step of the porch. ”I’m _sorry_ ,” he said, as if something terrible had happened, as if some awful tragedy had hit Lance’s family and it was all this random dude’s fault somehow.

Lance was just about to open his mouth in question when he heard his mama’s earth shattering inhale above him.

” _No_ ,” she gasped and Lance suddenly wondered if a tragedy really _had_ happened, and no one bothered to tell him. ”No—no, you’re—you’re _wrong_.”

”Mamá?” Lance asked weakly, and he didn’t ever want to see his mama looking like this, tears gathering at the waterline of her big, brown eyes, spilling onto her cheeks and gathering beneath her trembling chin. She looked down on him then, wiped the tears away and took his hand to pull him up from the porch.

”It’s okay, papi—listen, why don’t you go inside for a second and I’ll—I’ll talk to these men for a while, okay, sunshine? Mi vida? Sounds good, yeah?” she said, smiling, but it wasn’t a smile that Lance had ever seen on any face before, and then suddenly Veronica stood by the door, eyes wide, hand clutching at the doorframe.

” _Leif?_ ” She said the man’s name as if she recognized him—and suddenly it dawned on Lance that this Leif guy was wearing a Galaxy Garrison uniform. ”What’s going on?” she asked and took a step out on the porch.

”Take Leandro inside,” their mama said in sharp Spanish, but not unkind. Lance stood frozen in his mama’s hold staring at Leif, at the many medals on his chest, and he recognized some of them— _it’s the same ones dad has on his uniform_ , he remembered.

”Why are—” Veronica started, and took yet another step closer—

”Go _inside_ , Veronica,” his mama snapped and she gathered Lance in her arms and ushered him towards his big sister who immediately trapped him in her own hold. Lance clutched at Veronicas wrists, and she brought him closer towards her, put her hand over his head, as if protecting him from something.

”Mamá,” Veronica said, her voice breaking. Lance whipped his head around and looked up the last couple of inches of height she still had on him, and saw that Veronica had started crying as well.

”Ronnie?” he whispered, wondering if anyone could even hear him anymore. It seemed to do the trick; Veronica almost flinched at his voice, looked down at him with a pale face before she furrowed her eyebrows in determination.

”Come on, cariño, let’s—let’s go inside and watch some tv,” she ordered suddenly, a complete switch in attitude that had Lance’s head spinning. Before he knew it, Veronica had a firm grip of his shoulders and started leading him inside—Lance found his eyes drifting to the mailbox, wondering if he would miss the mailman because of this—and then they were inside and the front door was closed. Lance could only hear the beginning of the muffled conversation outside before Veronica turned up the volume of the tv, sizzling every other sound out.

It took a long time before his mama came back inside. His tío arrived only a minute after, a wild look to his eyes that Lance had only ever seen once before, last year when he climbed that tree in their backyard and broke his wrist and his tío found him lying on the ground in a heap of limbs.

He caught Lance’s gaze—an electrical current buzzing between them—and just like that the rest of the day turned into some kind of nightmare Lance couldn’t wake up from. He couldn’t help blaming the two men for interrupting his lazy summer day. He hadn’t even gotten the acceptation letter in the mail yet before Mr. Leif told his mama about the accident that took the life of a senior pilot earlier that day—his mama, who later had to break the news to her children and her brother in law. They all gathered in the kitchen; Luis, small and wide eyed in their mama’s lap; Marco, sitting between her and tío Jaime, his head going back and forth looking between the two adults in the room; Veronica, holding onto Lance as if he’d fall through the floor if she let go of him. Lance didn’t think the information really hit him until his mama had to call Rachel, his oldest sister, and tell her everything all over again. When he saw the white knuckled grip around the phone, heard his mama’s voice tremble and the distant echoes of his sister's crying through the speaker, and it was the realization that his dad would never get to meet his first grandchild that tipped him over. That his dad never would get to see them grow up. That Lance would never get to tell his dad about the new boy that moved in a week ago a few houses down the road, and about—about how _cute_ Lance thought he was. His dad would never know. Would never get to know _anything_ about his own son anymore.

Suddenly Lance’s whole world came tumbling down and crashing to the floor, pieces rolling out the front door to the wooden porch, spilling down the two steps and sinking into the gravel, forever ingrained in the very foundation of their home. Lance was so sure he would finally get the opportunity to show his dad what he had been missing out on after all these years spent in the air, but the letter in the mailbox didn’t seem that impending anymore. The self-indulgent fantasies of Lance sitting in one of his dad’s classes, showing off how much he knows about space and piloting, suddenly so out of reach.

_Silly little fish_ , his dad said too often around Lance, _you’ve got your head in the clouds already, don’t you?_

Lance wondered what his dad’s last thoughts were. If it was something as simple as Oppy’s—if he even had the time to think about them, to send out one last wish, his heartbeat a beacon traveling all the way home to his family in Varadero.

_My battery is low and it’s getting dark,_ Opportunity had sent to Earth one sunny June day right before a dust storm hit, covering her solar panels completely. The very same day, 13 years later, the first man on Mars died in a tragic freak accident at the Galaxy Garrison, leaving a wife and five kids behind. _Mayday, mayday, losing sight of the sky,_ were the last words recorded on the aircraft before it seemingly lost control and flew straight down into the ground—a glitch in the mechanics, a faulty wire, a loose screw. The crash was a wake up call, and the next generation of airplanes would have the issue fixed, with brand new safety measures for all future pilots.

And it was the end of another era of space travel that Lance never thought would come.

  
  


_Castle of Lions, present-day_

When the team got back from the meeting with General Aelix and her crew of sparkling crayon-colored soldiers, Allura announced the decision to keep the castle-ship in orbit around the planet. The intel of an incoming galra invasion was threatening, but it was the impending Great Wave that they decided was too big of a hazard to consider landing and staying put, unless Allura wanted her castle to get flooded of course, but Lance doubted it. She didn’t seem to think she was needed down on the surface either way, if the pleased smirk on her lips greeting them when they got to the bridge after leaving their lions in their hangars was anything to go by. She was proud of their diplomatic achievements, she’d explained as they all wearily treaded closer, since she hadn’t gotten a single complaint for the whole while they’d been down on the surface.

”Excuse me?” Lance scoffed at the backhanded compliment. He really wasn’t in the mood to be brought down a peg the first thing being back in the castle. ”We were all being _exemplary_ gentlemen down there.”

”And gentlelady,” Pidge added.

”And _gentlelady_ ,” Lance agreed, gesturing towards her slouching figure in her chair, shoes smearing red dirt all over the seat.

Allura did not look impressed.

”Of course,” she said, stiffly, eyes straying back over the other paladins, ”and because of your good behavior General Aelix has allowed me to prepare you for the mission. They will be needing most of our help on land, mostly in the city standing guard and helping civilians gather themselves and move underground. I and Coran will stay put in orbit around Aegis and help the aegian military forces keep track of the intel about the galra vessels—”

”So it’s been confirmed that they are headed here?” Keith interrupted and leaned forwards onto his knees. A careful glance towards him told Lance everything he needed to know about the red paladin—he was already gearing up for a fight.

”No,” Allura said, paused, didn’t meet Keith’s inquiring gaze once, ”not confirmed, but highly likely.” She sighed with uncharacteristic exhaustion. ”This wouldn’t be the first time the galra have attempted to invade Aegis in modern times. General Aelix has told me about previous galra vessels landing to gather their own intel about the aegians, although none of them have made it out of their atmosphere to bring the intel back. The galra are very sensitive to the aegian native speech and are nearly incapacitated at the sound.”

At this Lance straightened up in his seat. His eyes immediately latched onto Keith, the information shedding new light onto their first meeting with the aegians, onto the fact that Keith was the only one of them who completely keeled over from Lieutenant Eermes greeting. Keith himself refused to even acknowledge Lance, refused to acknowledge the fact that Allura failed to inform him of this before they breached the atmosphere, looking like he couldn’t care less with his stoic expression and elbows resting casually on his knees.

Well, Lance cared enough for the both of them, and it didn’t sit well with him that no one else seemed to think of the fact that the chances of Keith being in that kind of pain again were rather big.

”We have created a program for the civillian aegians to quickly learn your language that was sent to General Aelix several days ago, quite enough time for them to get a knack of it,” Coran reassured them quickly, as he too noticed the way Lance’s brain was starting to work on overdrive at their lack of reactions.

”And how can we trust that they won’t use their language against us?” Lance questioned, saw Keith finally twisting his head towards him in his peripheral.

”General Aelix will do whatever it takes to protect her people, and she needs us, she _needs_ Voltron. This is why Aegis has managed to keep their independence in this sector of the universe for so long,” Allura continued, not even pausing to recognize Keith and how this have and most likely will continue to affect him. ”The galra can’t rely on sound, can’t trust their own comm or translators as they attack, but I am sure this won’t stop them from trying again. Aegis may be located in an isolated area, but this galaxy is practically run by Zarkon personally. It’s only about time that he makes sure to take over the last remaining planet in his domination.”

Another thought hit Lance suddenly. A tiny star blinking rapidly in the furthest reach of his mind, urgently, and it’s the memory of a map that Allura had showed them before their journey to this planet. A sharp image of the outskirts of a galaxy that Lance could draw out himself if asked.

”We’re not that many galaxies away from the Milkyway,” Lance stated, and the silence came over them like a tidal wave. Lance looked around the room, but no one had any reassuring words to offer him.

Images of galra vessels attacking Earth flashed through his head. Horrible, gruesome images. Soldiers lying on the ground, both human and galra. Blaring sirens. His family forced to evacuate. Blood pooling in the cracks of their front porch. Colorful Lego pieces scattered across the concrete.

Allura looked at him with her neat eyebrows hanging low over her eyes. She’s tired, Lance thought.

”Yes,” she said, finally an acknowledgement, as if this tiny thought had already crossed her mind before, and that was just what it was. A thought. A tiny star blinking in the background of supernovas and intergalactic war explosions. Not the first thing on their list of worries at the moment.

Thin air escaped his lungs, spread through his veins, filled his whole body—he had never felt quite this insignificant before.

The rest of the briefing went by in a blur. Lance tried to keep up his usually chipper tone throughout the whole thing, but wasn’t sure if he really succeeded in fooling anyone. A couple of worried looks were not so discretely cast his way as he didn’t immediately raise to the bait when Allura said she needed someone volunteering to stay with her to debrief the visit down to Aegis together with General Aelix.

He left the team on the bridge as soon as they were dismissed, weightless feet moving across the floor and hands faintly irking for pockets to ground themselves in. As if teleported, he found himself in his own room. He glanced around, over his own shoulder, saw the cluttered walls and messy piles of stuff he’s collected along the way—trinkets and souvenirs and gifts from aliens from thousands of different civilizations—and none of it really felt like it belonged.

Lance gathered a change of clothes and headed for the showers to seek sanctuary, but even the hot sprinkling of water on his shoulders couldn’t wash away the worry that tensed and un-tensed his muscles, like broken machinery. He leaned his forehead on the tile wall, water dripping down his temples, and he felt as if he was still wearing his armor—his bones urging to strip out of his own skin, and he thought _no one knows who I am here; another soldier at war, another body ready for slaughter._ The want to slowly disintegrate into the wall was unrelenting, soon his scull would crack from the pressure. He thought it would help pretending that his hands were someone else’s hands, arms circling around his own chest, holding himself down, but then breathing suddenly turned into a chore instead of a necessity.

As if the room would cave in on him if he went too slow, Lance rushed through the rest of his shower, got dressed and briskly made his way through the door—only to bump his chest right into Keith.

” _Dude_ ,” he wheezed, but hardly cared enough to stay and hear any offered apologies.

”Hey,” Keith called out for him anyway, ”hey, _Lance_ —” he brought his hand up to catch a hold of Lance’s sleeve as to stop him from walking away, and Lance thought _no one knows me here, another step up the ladder, another tiny dot in the sky,_ and pulled his arm free from his grip.

”I’m _fine_ ,” he urged, a bit too loud as always. Keith looked up at him with surprised, wide open eyes, and staring into them made Lance feel as if he was treading the edge of something unfathomable. Lance did not feel like drowning tonight. He twirled around Keith smoothly and rushed down the hallway, with Keith’s deranged shouting reverberating after him.

_Lance! Hey, Lance! What are you doing?_ _Where are you going? Who do you think you are?_

The hardest questions in the universe.

Lance felt as if the answers, that probably didn’t even exist but _should_ have, had been stolen from him somehow. And it hurt like echoes must hurt when they touch the walls of a cave, nonexistent words and empty reminders that here it used to be something that is no more. Lance keeps grasping at the walls but there’s nothing to grab onto. Where was he supposed to go when the illusion of belonging, of identity, of purpose had revealed itself to be a frameless, crackling mirror—when in the end, it’s only him looking at himself, desperately throwing the never ending search for answers between himself and his reflection. What was he really supposed to do when it turned out the thief had been him all along?

_Who do you think you are, Lance?_

No one knows who he is here, on a planet unknown to humanity. No one _cared._ A Blue Paladin was a Blue Paladin no matter which planet you saved. In the frontlines, at war, you simply do what needs to be done; march on until something stops you from marching, and then you march _again_. Sometimes, in the middle of the battlefield, Lance thought the only possible explanation to all of this was that it’s some kind of test, that you have to take two steps forward and then one step back; a quick look over your shoulder to see how many bodies has kept themselves off the ground, feel the blood freeze in your veins when you can’t count the six people you care about the most—and then you keep moving ahead, hoping to God you will see them again at the end of the day. It’s figuring out that this slow paced moving forwards is what you’re supposed to call progress. The planets won’t stop turning, the universe won’t stop expanding, Zarkon won’t stop his tyranny just because someone’s homesick; the inside of his armor might be the last thing Lance would ever know—not his mama’s buttery toasts at breakfast or sneaking out in the middle of the night to fly in the simulators at Garrison. If Lance died here, it would be on the other end of a weapon, too far away from Earth to even really matter to anyone.

Lance couldn’t see the point in trying to establish himself in a war zone.

Keith didn’t follow him through the Castle hallways, but Lance ran anyway. When he got to this point in his spiraling he liked to think of himself as an engine. The soles of his feet smacking against the floor was a drumming familiar enough by now, along with the repetitive pumping of his legs, the acid spreading through his limbs, the sudden thought that it didn’t bother him as much anymore, that this at least couldn’t hurt him.

Before Voltron, running was one of Lance’s least favorite things, it was so easy to come up with excuses to skip P.E. that he almost failed the class completely. It wasn’t that he didn’t like exercise or sports, it’s just running in particular that never appealed to Lance as a concept. Running, a prepubescent Lance reasoned, implied being chased, or even worse, _chasing_ something that he might never reach. But he didn’t really have much of a choice anymore, did he? Becoming a part of Voltron made running as inevitable as accidentally walking in on someone mid-shower in the Castle’s common changing rooms, but Lance would still not call himself a runner—not in the way that Keith was a runner. It came so naturally for him. Lance has even glimpsed it in his eyes a few times, that volatile fight or flight response that just wasn’t there in your usual person. It was worrying how often Keith seemed to grapple with the instinct to run even in the most mundane of situations, and the worst of it all was that with nothing to offer and everything to lose there was nothing Lance could do that would stop Keith from running and never coming back. Anything could set him off, which caused Lance to tread extra lightly around him. No sweet talk. No pick up lines. Absolutely no touching on any subject that could reveal the dumpster fire that was Keith’s past. Lance has learned this the hard way: Keith runs when you get too close to home, when you start off too soft, when you prod, gently; runs so he won’t have to learn that caring is not something to be beaten into. Getting close to Keith was like fumbling through a minefield. Something Lance has turned out not being particularly good at either.

No. Not a runner. And definitely not a Keith-whisperer. If anything, Lance fancied himself more of a hider. Hiding was easy. Hiding was clinging onto Rachels back when she was about to leave home for college so she wouldn’t see her baby brother crying. Hiding was graciously letting Marco try their dad’s new hover bike first in the backyard in front of the family so Lance wouldn’t get blamed for accidentally scratching the paintwork a few hours earlier when he sneaked out to try it out himself. Hiding was flirting exclusively, _excessively_ some might say, with girls, because girls were safe and reliable and historically more approachable. Hiding was to throw insults at the pretty boy in his pilot class even though Lance would really rather desperately have wanted to be his friend—and, perhaps, hiding was also pretending to forget bonding moments with said pretty boy because acknowledging such a moment would be too fucking close to admitting his true feelings. To admitting changing.

Hiding came as easy for Lance as running came for Keith, a rusty but trusted defense mechanism to easily fall back into—and just like that, Lance found himself standing back on the now empty bridge, hand already pushing onto the control panel to activate the star-map projector. He hadn’t even realized this was where his feet were taking him.

” _C’mon_ ,” he groaned when the universe didn’t immediately expand into the open space around him. He fiddled with the panel, leaving his fingerprints all over the whole thing, and still nothing happened.

Hiding was totally easy, yes, but keeping his hyper focused ass entertained after finding a hiding spot was an entirely different issue.

”Stupid, 10,000 year old piece of _garba_ —”

The clearing of a throat echoed across the bridge.

Lance whipped his whole body around at the sound, hiding his hands behind his back as if he’d just been caught with them stuck in a cookie jar. Shiro grinned back at him from the doorway, holopad still brightly lit up in his grip, illuminating his face in the otherwise dark room.

”You need a hand?” he asked, nodding towards the control panel.

”Uh,” Lance stalled, glancing up and down from Shiro’s face to the control panel next to him. ”I just—I mean, I was just—”

Shiro strolled towards Lance without him even finishing his sentence.

”You have to flick your wrist right,” Shiro stepped up next to Lance and put his hand on top of the panel, ”see? Or else it won’t recognize your quintessence,” he continued, dragging his hand across the lit up panel and, suddenly, stars exploded all around them, expanding the walls of the bridge to infinite scales. Lance took an unsteady step backwards, head tilted towards the high ceiling and gasped.

”There,” Shiro said, satisfied, and hugged the holopad to his chest, looking almost as in awe as Lance.

”Can you get us to Earth?” Lance whispered, as if a single loud note would shatter the illusion. He felt Shiro’s gaze landing on him, heavy as armor, but couldn’t care enough to meet his eyes. The stars blinked at him from every direction, billions and billions of them. Lance had no idea how one would even begin to create such an elaborated map.

Shiro shifted his hand somewhat on the panel and suddenly they were flying through space in the speed of something yet unfounded. Lance could almost feel the whiplash when they slowed down in an abrupt halt at a tiny, familiar pocket of the universe.

”Here,” Shiro said and pointed across the room—unnecessarily, since Lance had already stumbled down the narrow platform of the control panel and made his way towards the modest star, hiding in the background.

”Zoom,” Lance whispered again, eyes straining to catch even a flicker of what he was looking for.

The tiny dot of a planet grew until it was roughly the size of his palm, floating serenely in front of his eyes. Lance’s breath caught in his throat—the room falling into a silence so thick it could suffocate.

_Home_ , he thought, stretched his hand out until the very tips of his fingers breached the hologram.

”It’s so small.”

Compared to the other planets around them, Earth was nothing but a tiny blue speck.

”She’s strong though,” Shiro countered, stepping up next to Lance, watching him clenching his fist around the hologram as if it was a physical thing he could just grab and put in his pocket. ”I think they’ll be alright over there. Earth is strong, and so are _people_ , Lance. It’s our one secret weapon, all of us—we’re strong as long as we stick together.”

Lance dropped his hand, the hologram of Earth only flickering for a fraction of a second before regaining its sharp, detailed surface.

”I don’t feel strong.”

It’s a gaping ache somewhere in his chest where that strength was missing. Lance used to feel it, way, way back in the day. He remembered the immense urge to explore, to protect, to turn every rock and climb every tree and jump every puddle. How he used to pull his siblings sleeves to engage in play combat and march down the hot pavement of their street. Lance remembered the hope. That naive, buzzing _hope_ that only existed in children and people who haven’t stared right down the muzzle of a gun. It’s all gone now. Forgotten. Vacant. All that’s left was a decaying wasp nest somewhere inside him that he couldn’t figure out how to get rid of.

”I don’t think that’s required,” Shiro hummed. Lance glanced over his shoulder with skeptically raised eyebrows and caught his gaze. Shiro smiled, a small, warm smile that usually stayed reserved for Keith, or Pidge maybe. ”It’s not required to _feel_ strong in order for you to _be_ strong, Lance. That’s—I don’t think that’s how this works.” Shiro looked back over the hologram, eyes trailing even the furthest of stars treading along the distance. ”Allura told me she was afraid that day when you died,” he said, voice going sharp at the last word, like when the needle hits the vinyl record before the music comes on.

Lance yelped, turning his own head away.

”Would’ve been kind of fucked up if she wasn’t,” he laughed, shallowly. It echoed across the room.

”Yeah,” Shiro said after a few seconds, and chuckled lightly. ”It would. I think that’s my point. She was scared that she wasn’t strong enough, that you were going to stay dead—and I told her this as well; I believe with all my heart that her fear helped her channeling her power into saving you. Like a catalyst. Allura called upon every part of her body and mind, including the fear that she would lose you, and she brought you back to life.”

Lance gulped at that. Couldn’t help a sharp breath from interrupting.

”I don’t think anyone of us feel very strong,” Shiro continued, gracious enough not to pay attention to Lance discretely trying to wipe away his tears. ”I know at least _I_ don’t feel that strong—honestly, I feel scared shitless most of the time. For myself, and for all of you. I blame myself for bringing you all into this, you’re just _kids,_ I shouldn’t have encouraged you to find Blue, I should’ve left you on Earth and—” Shiro sighed, and then he sighed again. ”Sometimes I don’t know how I make it out of bed, but it is what it is. It’s not pretty, but we have each other. And I have seen all of you train and turn into some of the most exceptional soldiers I have ever had the honor of serving with. We are a team, and teammates can lean on each other to help keep us going.” A heavy, cold hand dropped on top of Lance’s shoulder, soothing the trembling of his limbs. ”It’s alright, Lance. It’s okay to feel afraid.”

”I just—” Lance swallowed harshly, trying to talk around the fist that had lodged itself in his throat. ”I don’t know what I’m supposed to do—I feel so _worthless_.” He forced the words out of his teeth like it was a prison break. Like the words were fleeing for their life. As if they’d been starving inside of him all this time.

Worthless. Replaceable. Insignificant. _Forgettable_.

Shiro’s grip tightened around Lance’s shoulder, turning him around until they faced each other.

” _Lance_ —” he bowed his head until he was looking him right in the eyes, connecting them by a humming wire, and Lance felt seen in a way he’s never felt seen by Shiro before ”—listen, the universe works in mysterious ways. You don’t have to have everything figured out right now. It’s okay to be a bit lost on the way. We’re all just barely scraping by here, and sometimes that’s all you can do. What matters is that we keep moving, that we don’t fall in a ditch and get stuck—and it’s important to me that you know we are here to help you if that ever happens.” Lance nodded, sniffled, could only somewhat grasp whatever Shiro was offering. Shiro nodded back at him, smiled again, and this time it felt as if maybe that smile wasn’t just for Keith. That, maybe, it could be for all of them, if Lance would let it be. ”I’m not saying everything happens for a reason, but I truly believe everything will make sense eventually—we will create our own meaning,” Shiro continued. ”It will matter because we _made_ it matter.”

Shiro dropped his hold of Lance’s shoulder and took a step away from him, as if checking if Lance could stand on his own legs, only to bring him back into an embrace Lance didn’t even know he’d been craving. Shiro’s arms swallowed him. Buried him into the nook of his neck. Enclosed him in warmth that has been severely lacking lately. The kind of warmth that waited idly when he tripped up on his bike and went sliding across the concrete back home, scraping his both his knees and elbows and thinking he was legitimately going to die. The kind of warmth that came running from their porch and bent on the knees to check up on him, to coddle him and bring him into its arms. The kind of warmth only his mama and Rachel could manage with a few well placed kisses and reassuring words. _I saw you flying, Sunshine, thought you’d need some new band-aids to power up the engines._

Lance closed his eyes, brought his trembling hands up to Shiro’s back and hoped he could bring at least a fraction of that warmth for him as well. Shiro held him tighter, angled his head until Lance felt his chin resting against the side of his head.

”You are worth something just for existing, Lance,” Shiro whispered, a final thought needing to be acknowledged. ”Alright? Just for existing.”

Lance kept his eyes open, looking over Shiro’s shoulder and sticking his gaze to the tiny replica of Earth that kept floating further into the room, eternally spinning no matter the chaos in the universe, and he nodded, dazed, and still he thought that it all seemed a bit too good to be true.

—

Lance could have sworn his toes were turning black and ready to fall off, one after the other, if it weren’t for the fact that he still could wiggle them… slightly.

The floors in the Castle hallways were freezing, and Lance had no idea where he last put his lion slippers. They’d been gone for a few days now, which meant he was a worrying amount of days closer to dying of hypothermia— _which_ was incredibly frustrating since the problem could be easily solved by just finding the slippers. Even though he told himself every morning in bed when he woke up to cold castle floors that he would, he always seemed to forget to actually look for them, because there were so many other things to do: they had drills and practice and lunch and planets to save and galra to fight and suddenly it would be too late and then he had to roam the hallways cold and slipper-less.

It wasn’t the first time he’d misplaced his slippers. Honestly, those goddamn slippers could probably become expert Castle of Lion guides themselves now with how much roaming and exploring they’ve done. Voluntarily or not. It’s rare for Lance to go a whole day without losing at least one important thing. Back home in Varadero he would lose stuff like his keys and his phone (except he didn’t really lose it, to be honest, he just forgot to bring it with him to begin with, it always made his mama furious), and his homework (sorry again, mama), and the lock for his bike (the bike got stolen three times because of that, but then Marco would threaten to kick the shit out of anyone who had anything to do with it at school and so the bike always found it’s way back to Lance in entirely mysterious ways). It was just something he’d gotten used to by now. Losing things. Voluntarily or not _._

Lance knew for a fact that he didn’t have his slippers in possession when they arrived here at the outskirts of Aegis. He had looked in his room already—duh, he’s not an amateur—and they were definitely not in there. The bridge was also a no-go, since he was almost 100% sure he hadn’t strayed in there with the slippers on at any point, like, ever. At least not since that first day with the alarm going off when he overslept. And it wasn’t exactly the ideal time to look for his blue, squeaky, lion slippers on the bridge anyway, not right after his pleasant little chat with Shiro.

After Shiro let go of him Lance had calmed down and stopped crying, but that stuffy, cotton-like feeling you get after crying had spread over Lance’s entire face. ”I’ll leave you alone now,” Shiro had said, very gently, and then left the room. He probably thought he’d finished doing his leader-y duties for the day and moved on to something else. Lance hadn’t stuck around on the bridge for long after that either, and found himself pretty quickly back in his room, snuggled up in bed beneath his blanket, his slippers not even entering his mind once. He was too busy worrying about making a fool of himself in front of _Shiro_ —the guy Lance had on a poster up on his wall back home. _That_ , Shiro.

Fuck everything, honestly.

Lance didn’t want to think about it right now. Or ever. He was too busy looking for his slippers now, when everyone was asleep and Shiro was nowhere to accidentally knock into and have awkward post-emotional-chat silences with.

He kind of wished Rachel was here. She would know exactly where to look for his slippers—she was like a bloodhound that way—and then Marco would wake everyone up and bully Pidge into using the castle security cameras to see if they could find them quicker that way (but really he’d do it just to get out of actually searching), and Veronica would be her usual unusable self and just, like, glare annoyingly at Keith the whole time to see if he would do anything about it and confirm everything Lance has ever told her about him, or something, and then Luis—

_Luis_.

Lance’s walking hitched slightly at the thought of his baby brother, a misstep, a piece larger than usual chipping away from inside his chest.

He missed them all more than ever now, in the middle of the night in an alien space ship where there was nothing to remind him of them. It was entirely too empty here, too clean and grey-scaled. Lance was used to clutter and messes and noise. He’s used to having a big family. So big that in the mornings there was always a rushed scatter of feet scrambling down the stairs just to fight over who gets the best place at the table at breakfast; a family so big that the bathroom doors seemed to be locked all day long no matter when Lance went to check (and when he finally got in he could almost understand Veronica for hogging it for an hour— _almost_ ); so big that music in all possible genres from punk rock to k-pop to old cuban records from his abuela’s collection could be heard playing from at least three different rooms of the house at the same time. Lance remembered bundles of coats and jackets peaking out after being hastily thrown into the mirrored closet that they always left half way open in the hall, because someone—friends, cousins, niblings and neighbors—kept using their front door as some kind of 24/7 open hotel reception, so there was no use ever really closing it. Lance remembered screaming at the top of his lungs for Marco to stop fucking stealing his boxers just because he’s too lazy to throw his own in the laundry, and Veronica acting like the stuck up current-oldest-child-of-the-household telling him to watch his language, and he recalled his abuela stuttering out consonants as she stumbled over all the names of the McClain family until finally landing on the right one. Lance didn’t blame her, there were a lot of names to keep track off.

A big family, with equally big personalities. It’s easy to imagine you would feel like fading into the background with all that noise and movement, but Lance thrived in the familiar chaos it ensued. He longed for the mundane nagging and teasing, casually enforced by his siblings, for the domestic stress of getting ready for school in the morning, for moments like trying to shove his baby brother up the rope ladder so they could join the rest of their siblings and cousins in the old treehouse in their backyard, and then realizing halfway through that he couldn’t possibly fit up there too, not that it stopped them all from trying.

Lance longed for all of it.

Being the fourth out of five siblings, Lance grew up only knowing what it’s like to have a big family. That’s why waking up from a nightmare where he couldn’t recall his own baby brother’s name— _Luis_ —had him rattled enough to get him out of bed to roam the castle.

The intrusive thoughts still lingered in his head, though… made him wonder if he was fading from his family’s mind just as they were from his.

Altean music played through the hallways, a toned down hush lingering between the walls as you walked past. It reminded Lance of elevator music, you know, the kind you so distinctly know to be elevator music but can’t recall even if offered a million dollars to hum the tune. It’s that same generic background noise that fits so nicely into liminal spaces you hardly even think of it while passing through. It wasn’t the same as hearing Marco play angsty Evanescence-esque songs at the top capacity of his speakers in his room, or hearing the upbeat tempo of Los Van Van from downstairs and the matching echoes of his parents laughter and singing when his dad was home for once. But Allura was trying hard to make him feel less alien in her space castle and Lance didn’t want to complain that the music she so generously had hooked up for him wasn’t the _right_ kind of music _,_ so he shut up about it. A smirk and pointed finger guns in her general direction was all it took for her to feel satisfied and move on.

She tried. But it wasn’t enough.

So, while on the very brink of death from his probable pneumonia and mind-numbing elevator music, Lance stubbornly wandered the empty hallways in a feeble search for his slippers. He’d been at it for about an hour, which meant an hour of endless corridors that had no business being so long and menacing. It was completely different from when everyone was awake, he realized. Even though space couldn’t provide them with any natural light to distinguish day and night it still made a world of difference to hear his teammates mind their business in a constant hum of noises during their wake-hours. This eerie silence felt intruding in a way Lance did not like one bit. He was half convinced Allura or Coran—or, heck, maybe even the space mice—would jump out from behind a corner and reveal that this had all been an intricate joke just to mess with him.

It was with the—already quite unlikely—thought experiment of Allura appearing behind a corner, dangling his missing slippers all tauntingly in front of his face, that Lance was met by the sudden and very real sight of Keith fighting a wall… uh… which was completely normal behavior, Lance supposed. It was just Keith, the very respected Red Paladin, picking a fight with the castle itself in the dead of night. And okay, so, Lance can admit that that in itself wasn’t too off-brand for Keith, maybe. Except, like, Keith didn’t fight the wall at all how he normally fights; with an effortless kind of aggression that usually only requires no more than one or two hits before zeroing in on the weakest spot in his target. No, this was not like that at all. This kind of fighting was all repetitive and inconsolable—a masochistic streak that Lance’s never observed in Keith before.

What the idiot was doing was this; the tips of his fingers pressed into the wall for a second before folding his hand into a fist and smashing it into the flat surface, the motion almost too quick for Lance to even realize what just happened. Then he was back again, fingers straightened, fingertips masking the spot like a bullseye. Occasionally he’d pull his arm even further back and really hit the wall as if it’d insulted his entire family line, only to immediately wince on impact as his knuckles cracked and groaned, his neck hunched over in pain—and then start it up again with the weird finger flexing and wall punching as if he didn’t just almost break his own hand.

Lance froze on the spot, in pure chock, and didn’t even know how to react until the third time he saw Keith wincing enough to gasp out loud.

”What the _fuck_ are you doing?” Lance hissed suddenly, the weight of the reaction surprising even himself, and rushed for Keith’s clutched fist when the lunatic whipped around to face him. Lance turned his hand over to look at the bloody mess that was Keith’s knuckles. He’d broken through the skin, definitely, the proof was right there with all the blood and the red, angry wound at the tip of his middle knuckle. Lance couldn’t possibly tell if he’d broken anything else, not that he’d let it stop him from examine the hand anyway.

”Uhm,” Keith said after a few indulgent moments of playing the patient to Lance’s nurse. The inquiring sound made Lance finally turn his head to look at Keith, and the stunned expression on Keith’s face would have been enough to make him drop his grip of the hand, if he hadn’t followed it up with this absolutely award winning explanation: ”I’m just growing stronger bones.”

Lance gaped at him.

”What the fuck,” he said.

”It’s science,” Keith frowned.

Lance doubted it.

In fact, he doubted it so much he was just about to ask how the fuck it could be any kind of known science to grow bones by punching a wall made up of a material stronger and sturdier than anything that could’ve ever been found on Earth, when Keith huffed in annoyance.

”It _is_ ,” he insisted and roughly pulled his hand out of Lance’s, and barely managed to conceal the wince that followed. Lance took a small step closer, you know, just in case Keith was about to faint or something from the pain, but Keith only glared at him. ”You have to break down the bones so they can heal stronger. I know what I’m doing, Lance—” Lance arched an eyebrow ”—okay, maybe I should have found something softer to hit, but Shiro has locked me out of the training deck, so,” Keith gestured vaguely to the side, ”wall, I guess.”

Lance glanced back and forth between the wall and Keith, not entirely sure he’s buying any of this.

”Sure,” he landed on at the end, a very _shaky_ landing, he might add, ”sounds legit.”

”Uh, yeah, it is,” Keith said, equally surprised and suspicious of Lance’s sudden change of heart. Lance didn’t care much for the suspicion. If Keith wanted to fist fight walls, then who was Lance to stop him? He had already moved on from worrying about the mysterious workings of Keith’s mind to worrying about the questionable workings of his hand.

”You should probably get that looked at,” Lance pointed out, nodding towards the offending hand dangling at Keith’s side. ”And then head to bed—what’s the time, anyway? Like half past should’ve-been-asleep-hours-ago?” Lance turned his head dramatically as if a magical clock would appear on the wall.

”It’s not so bad,” Keith said, because of course he did, and Lance almost didn’t have the strength to rein in the pitying look he’d been about to unleash on him.

”Not so _bad_? Dude, you’re dripping blood on the floor. Allura’s gonna kill you—if you don’t die of blood loss before then, I suppose,” Lance mused, thoughts straying back to Allura jumping out from a corner, dangling his lion-slippers in his face, and simultaneously aiming her Altean-superpowers at Keith’s pale, limp body and really knocking some sense back into him. He shook his head. ”You should at least clean it up, make sure no weird space germs gets into that nasty cut.”

”I was gonna do that anyway,” Keith muttered and looked down at his swollen hand. And okay, so maybe Lance wasn’t going to look at him with pity at all, but with actual concern and worry for his wellbeing, because, _c’mon_ —how stupidly cute can a dumb, masochistic half-human be?

Lance groaned.

Very stupidly cute, apparently.

”Let’s go,” he said and walked past Keith through the corridor. Keith frowned at him as their shoulders brushed.

”You’re coming with me?”

”Yeah.”

”Really?”

”Yeah.”

”Okay.”

And that was that. Lance was only half suspicious of the lack of complaints and reckoned this a feat in his favor. Really, he should go for this strategy every time he encounters a Keith in the wild. They walked together through the endless of corridors, and arrived pretty quickly in the med wing, as if the castle itself had rearranged its hallways just for them. Lance gestured Keith over to the hospital-bed by the cabinet where he knew Coran stocked the band-aids and cleaning supplies and all other kinds of medical stuff for minor injuries.

”It’s gonna sting,” he warned Keith as he soaked a tissue with an Altean anti-bacterial soap thingy and sat down next to him on the bed. Keith just glared at him.

”I think I can handle it,” he said, and Lance must give it to him, he didn’t even flinch as Lance roughly pressed the tissue against his knuckles. The weirdo even grinned at him.

”Whatever, tough guy,” Lance muttered.

A few moments passed in silence with Lance cleaning up the wound and messing around in the cabinet to find some kind of adhesive bandage that wouldn’t feel too awkward on the knuckles. He was so focused he didn’t really notice Keith looking at him until he looked up himself for a quick peek. Keith didn’t even react to being caught staring.

”What were you doing up anyway?” he asked, eyebrows furrowed. Lance froze, only for a second—since when did Keith start caring about Lance’s sleeping schedule again?—and then he finished patching up his knuckles, admiring his work. ”Lance,” Keith prompted.

”Me?” he said, as if there were several other Lances in the room Keith could’ve been talking to. Keith seemed to read that thought straight out of Lance’s mind and wrinkled his forehead. ”Oh, uh, I was just looking for my slippers—y’know, the blue lion ones? I bet you have a pair yourself, but of Red probably, although I haven’t seen you wearing them at all—what’s up with that, huh? You don’t wanna rep the red-lion pride or something? Are you ashamed of Red, Keith? Is that it? After everything Red has done for you, and you can’t even wear a pair of silly slipp—”

”Lance,” Keith said again, exasperated.

”What?” Lance said, _equally_ exasperated.

”Your slippers are right there,” Keith said and nodded towards the center of the room. And there they were, neatly placed right next to the raised platform of the cryo-pods.

”Oh.”

Lance remembered now. He’d been stubbornly stationed outside of Hunks cryo-pod until he got out, and brought his slippers just incase he was going to have to sleep there, and you know, cold floors and all, but then Hunk got out only after about 15 minutes and Lance hadn’t even gotten the chance to take as much as a nap. To be fair, Hunk was only put into the pod in the first place because of a burn on his hand after attempting to fry some kind of vegetable looking things from the last planet they’d visited. It wasn’t a super serious injury, but Lance still didn’t want him to get out of the pod with no one waiting for him.

”You probably forgot them there last week.”

”Yeah,” Lance said, staring at the slippers. ”I probably did.”

Keith gave him a weird look, as if he didn’t trust Lance was speaking the truth.

”So, you got out of bed in the middle of the night to look for your slippers,” Keith summarized. ”Do you like… need them to sleep or something?”

Lance frowned.

”As if you’ve got any room to judge, Mr. Tough-Guy Mc-I-Punch-Walls-For-Funsies,” he said and poked his finger into Keith’s ribs. Keith recoiled from he touch and glared at him again.

”I was just wondering,” he snapped.

”You were _so_ not, mullet— _nosy_ is what you were being.”

” _You_ asked me what I was doing, too!”

”Yeah, with good reason,” Lance said, as if it was obvious. ”You punched a wall, Keith. _Repeatedly_.”

Keith gaped at him, mouth opening and closing as if he couldn’t even find the words to respond.

”But I—my bones are weak?” was what he finally managed, which wasn’t exactly what Lance had been expecting him to say.

”I’m sorry, _what_ ,” Lance said.

”I have weak bones.” Keith looked down at his bandaged knuckles with the tiniest of pouts.

Lance couldn’t believe his ears. Keith was going to be the death of him.

”Why would you even need stronger _bones_?” Lance gaped. ”You should be happy with the one’s you have, _honestly_ , I bet they’re completely normal bones—I mean, uh, as normal as half-galra bones can be I suppose—but still! I’m sure your bones are nothing to feel embarrassed about, unless you’re having legit medical issues with them or something cause, like, I don’t really know what the gene pool of a human-galra hybrid looks like—” Keith shrunk more into his seat for every word that left Lance’s mouth ”—but, uh, so,” Lance trailed off, ”what even brought on the strong-bones obsession, really?”

Keith refused to meet his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest and mumbling under his breath.

”Sorry, I don’t speak ant,” Lance pointed out. Keith glanced up at him quickly and then immediately down to his lap again.

”I said, _because_ the Blade almost killed me,” he mumbled, only slightly louder. ”I didn’t even stand a chance at the trials. I have to be stronger.”

And the thing is, Keith looked serious as he said it. He kept flexing his hand, despite the fact that it probably hurt as hell—as if the fate of the entire world was hanging onto the hope of him growing stronger bones.

Lance looked at him with wide eyes, properly scandalized at the statement.

”That’s… just not right, man, Jesus Christ,” he said, finally, after a thorough evaluation of Keith’s truly poor psyche. ”Seriously, there’s not anything in the world that can measure strength in a way that actually matters—especially not _bones._ Who even told you that? Was it the Blade? Honestly, you may be half Galra, Keith… but you’re human too, and a wise man once told me that what makes humans so strong is the fact that we stick together, like your annoying neighbors after you threw a party that one time with _somewhat_ loud music… or—or _superglue_ that’s started leaking into the cap.” Lance hummed, and then he shimmied towards Keith smoothly over the bed and brought an arm over his hunched up shoulders. Keith gave him a dirty look for his sudden closeness. ”And there’s just no way you’re ever getting rid of us, so you won’t ever have to worry about your bones. You’re plenty strong already, okay? Don’t listen to the overgrown cat-furries.”

Keith turned his head away from Lance, but Lance could still detect the slight vibration of his shoulders and see the redness on his ears.

”Are you laughing?” Lance exclaimed, happily over-doing it if only to keep Keith going. ”I fucking knew it! Even _you_ think I’m funny!”

Keith shrugged his arm off and huffed.

”I never said you weren’t.”

”You _so_ have—”

”I really haven’t, Lance,” Keith said, suddenly frowning at him again. Oh well, a laughing Keith was fun as long as it lasted.

”Okay, _fine_ —so, you think my jokes are the pinnacle of humor, I get it,” Lance sighed and put his elbow on his knee to lean on. Then he looked over at Keith again. ”You know, you really shouldn’t let that go to my head,” he pointed out. Keith snorted.

”With the size of your head it’ll probably get lost along the way, I don’t think I have to worry.”

” _Ouch_ ,” Lance said and grimaced. ”You really know where to hit ’em, Keithy-boy.”

Keith laughed again, a light sounding laughter. It made something in Lance’s stomach coil itself into knots. He didn’t even protest the atrociousness of _Keithy-boy,_ which Lance definitely didn’t think he was going to get away with. Not that he was about to bring it up, no way. The scales were _definitely_ tipping in his favor right now.

Lance: 2

Keithy-boy: 0

Lance was happy to leave it like that, and despite the oddness of Keith willingly being around Lance’s vicinity, they fell into a pretty comfortable silence. Keith kept flexing his hand, as if worried that it would stop working if he didn’t keep it in constant movement. Lance thought the medically correct thing to do was probably the exact opposite of that, but he didn’t want to ruin the mood.

Suddenly, Keith quit his hand flexing and turned towards Lance.

”Are you okay?” he asked, right out of the blue. Lance raised both his eyebrows.

”Uh, like, mentally or…?”

” _No—_ I mean… I guess? Just, earlier—earlier today.” Keith fumbled with his hands again. Lance glanced down at them, and still didn’t get it. Keith groaned, lightly. ”When you ran into me,” he clarified, as if having to explain all of this was the very bane of his existence.

”Oh,” Lance said, still pretty confused, and then he gasped. ” _Oh_ … you mean _earlier_ today when I ran _into_ you?” Keith glared at him. Lance shuffled in his seat. Chuckled lightly. ”Yeah, sure, buddy. I’m good, I’m, uh, I’m _great_ even—I talked to Shiro and everything so it’s all cool now. Totally.”

”You talked to Shiro?” Keith questioned. And of course he got hung up on that part of the sentence, Lance thought.

”Well, more like _Shiro_ talked to _me_ ,” Lance confessed and scratched the back of his neck. Keith fell silent, until he snorted again.

”Yeah, he tends to do that,” he said, and smiled at Lance. Like, an actual smile, no-teeth-but-totally-amused-by-our-conversation kind of smile. Lance looked away, kind of afraid of what his own smile would reveal.

”I should probably go to sleep,” Lance said, abruptly, and jumped off the bed. Keith yelped slightly as the bed slid over the floor from the force. Lance looked back at him sheepishly, while still walking backwards towards the door. ”Oops, sorry.”

”Hey—” Keith said and got off the bed as well. And it felt all too familiar.

”Oh, wow, time really does fly when you have fun, doesn’t it?” Lance said, totally ignoring that he was interrupting whatever Keith was about to say, ”you know, can’t miss out on any more of that beauty sleep and all—”

”Lance—”

”I know, I know, you don’t care, you nocturnal cat-furry-hybrid, but some of us actually do need our eight hours of sleep, so—”

” _Lance_ ,” Keith hissed, and made it actually impossible for Lance to ignore, unless he wanted to sink to Keith’s level of social incompetence.

”What?” he hissed back, only a few feet from the door, and actually looked at Keith… who looked as if he was about to burst out in laughter. Lance frowned. ”What?” he asked again, now more confused than annoyed.

Keith tried to hide the smile, unsuccessfully, and gestured towards the cryo-pods. Lance’s eyes followed the direction of his hand and landed onto a pair of obnoxiously blue slippers, laying awfully lonely and forgotten on the floor.

Oh.

”Wouldn’t want to forget your slippers again,” Keith said, and Lance felt himself flush furiously as he strode across the room to get the damn slippers and then back again.

”Thanks,” he muttered and was just about to walk through the doors when Keith’s voice compelled him to stop one last time.

”Hey, Lance,” he said. The doors swooshed open at Lance’s proximity, but he froze anyway right in the doorway and turned to look at Keith.

”Oh my God, _what_?”

”About whatever’s bothering you,” Keith started, and looked kind of small suddenly, hands fisted at his sides, shoulders hunched in, as if he was about to say something he had no business speaking of—Lance adored him to pieces, just for that. ”Just, don’t think about it, okay?” he said, finally.

Lance stared at him.

”Don’t think about it?” he asked.

”Yeah, just… don’t.”

And… look, Lance has always _wanted_. His whole life he’s wanted things, desperately. Like that blue bike with the lighting bolts on the wheels that lit up when you started pedaling that he didn’t get for his eight birthday but still taunted him in every toy store they went to. Or to be the one that got to kiss Jessica L in that one empty classroom on the second floor right after acing a flight test. Or, going with his dad to the moon. All things that he’s wanted and craved that was impossible for him to get. And yet, none of that even compared to the thing he wanted right this moment. Which, of course, was simply to smile at Keith, and let him read whatever he wanted from that smile.

That want rose up in him like a pot of water ready to boil over.

But he shouldn’t. He really shouldn’t. Imagine the _consequences_.

So, ”sure,” he said instead, and turned his face away quickly before his big mouth managed to ruin things, a weak chuckle coming up his throat as if it would mask the terrible desire in his voice, ”yeah, uh, solid advice.”

Lance didn’t see how Keith reacted, but he hoped he hadn’t screwed this up again already.

”Good _night_ , Lance,” was the thing that Keith responded with, a final ending to their conversation. Which didn’t really calm Lance’s nerves, but at least gave him a window of escape.

”Yeah, good night, Keith,” he mumbled back, took the remaining steps out of the room and then, finally, the doors swooshed closed behind him.

Lance stood there a few seconds longer than necessary, simply staring at the wall across the floor, and then huffed one last time and began walking his way back to his room through the Castle hallways. A sneaky smile found its way to his lips no matter how much he tried to suppress it as he glanced down at the items in his hand.

Even if Lance _had_ screwed things up completely tonight, he was happy that at least he wouldn’t die of pneumonia anymore.

—

_”Lance, slow down!”_

_The childish voice whined through the hallway from somewhere behind him. Lance almost tripped on his own foot at the sudden noise but didn’t let it slow him down._

_”Seriously! Wait for me!”_

_There was something about that voice that tugged at Lance’s chest. Something about the desperation to catch up that had him looking over his shoulder in the dark to see who was following him. It wasn’t a surprise that it was a boy that came running out of the shadows, panting slightly, an angry tilt to his eyebrows. Lance stopped running, turned to face the boy and grinned teasingly. The boy came to a halt just in time before they collided, an exasperated huff escaping his mouth._

_”You’re a real jerk—mama said we’re not supposed to run in here—”_

_Mama?_

_Lance dropped his grin, only for a second, before he shook his head slightly and bent down to rest his palms on his knees to get on the same level as the boy._

_”Aw, are you afraid to break the rules?” Lance teased, the words coming out of his mouth as if they had a life of their own. The boy glared at him, his whole face twisting up in a sour scowl._

_”I’m not afraid!” the boy snapped. ”_ You’re _afraid!”_

_Lance sneered at him._

_”Why would I be afraid?” he asked. The boy crossed his arms over his chest and then he also sneered up at Lance, in a way that was uncomfortably familiar._

_”Because,” the boy said, ”you don’t even know where you are.”_

_Lance frowned. And then the lights flickered on around them, lighting up the hallway that was no longer a hallway, but a room._

_”See?” the boy mocked him. As Lance turned to look around him, oddly short of breath, he realized that no, he actually didn’t know where the fuck they were. There were paintings on the wall; old, expensive looking paintings, which had him thinking they were in a museum at least._

_”What—how—” Lance stammered, whipping his head around to find any sign or detail that could reveal their location, but even the paintings were blurry, as if someone’s been scrubbing them clean and done a piss poor job at it._

_The boy stood still, his arms remaining crossed, and calmly waited him out._

_”Told you,” he said, too smug for Lance’s liking. ”I know more than you do.”_

_Lance almost growled in irritation as he glared back down at the boy. He looked stupidly cute with his dimples and his dark brown curls and the blue bandaid across his cheek._

_”I know a lot of things!” Lance yelled. The boy arched an eyebrow._

_”Do you even know who I am?” he teased. Lance blanched at the question—because he didn’t… did he? He spoke to the kid as if he knew him… but now Lance only stared at him, mouth half open, and couldn’t find anything to say. The seconds passed. The boy’s sneer fading along rapidly as Lance failed to come up with any kind of retort. ”You—don’t you know who I am?” the boy questioned eventually, his face a re-opened wound._

_Lance’s heart started beating like crazy as he really looked at the kid. He looked barely eleven, a faded t-shirt with a Galaxy Garrison slogan on it, dirty converse and that blue bandaid on his cheek. He—did Lance know him? He was pretty sure he didn’t, but there was that weird tugging in his chest whenever the boy smiled like that, and even the bandaid seemed familiar._

_”I—” Lance started, ”I think—”_

_”You don’t_ remember _me?” the boy asked, shocked this time, taking one step closer to Lance who suddenly felt as if he wanted to run away and hide. Lance’s breath caught in his throat. He didn’t like the way the boy’s pouty underlip started quivering._

_”I don’t—” Lance managed once again, but the boy started crying for real now. Huge tears dripping down his cheeks, stubbornly staring at Lance, as if he couldn’t believe what was happening. ”No,_ shit _, don’t cry—I’m sorry, I—”_

_”Lance,” the boy sobbed, his small shoulders shaking with exertion. ”You left us. You’ve forgotten about us. It’s not_ fair _—”_

_”Hey, no—I’m right here, right here,” Lance urged and kneeled in front of the boy, hands hovering awkwardly over his arms. ”I’m not going anywhere, I promise—”_

_”You promised me,” the boy said suddenly. Lance gulped. ”You promised me you were coming back for the summer—you said… you said you were coming home, but you_ lied _.”_

_The accusation felt like a gunshot. Lance got up from the ground. The boy was shaking all over now, from the crying, of the fury emanating from him. Slowly, Lance started backing up, his eyes glued to the boy._

_”I waited for you,” the boy hiccuped, another bullet wound, ”I built my city in your room and I had to tear it apart and move it because mama said you were coming home, but—but you didn’t. I’m still waiting, Lance, and you don’t even remember me—”_

_Lance’s back hit the wall, a painting almost dropping to the ground in his haste to get away from the onslaught of incomprehensible accusations coming his way._

_”I’m sorry,” Lance whispered and slid down the wall, his eyes closed shut. ”I’m_ sorry _—”_

_”Lance, you can’t forget about us,” the boy begged, desperate, razor sharp even through the illusionary defense wall Lance tried to build around himself, ”you need to_ remember _.”_

_And Lance tried. He really did. But nothing came up in his head that was even remotely close to any kind of memories of the boy. He pressed his palms to his ears, wanted to shut the whole world out, wanted to crawl up somewhere and hide—and he wished he was back home._

_Home._

_Mama._

_The band-aid._

_The city._

_Lance gasped._

_The_ boy _._

_He slammed open his eyes and whipped his head up to catch the boy again, to reassure him, to tell him that he knew him—he fucking_ knew _him—_

_but the boy was gone._

_”Wait—” Lance rasped, ”wait, where did you go?” he shouted, scrambling up from the floor where he’d sunk down. The lights started flickering the farther into the room he went. ”Kid! Where did you go?”_

_No one answered. Lance had no idea where he was._

_”I know, now—I know you,” he whispered, a fleeting memory taking form, slipping on Lego, a cut on the cheek, a little brother crying and Lance rushing down the stairs to get the blue band-aids and a mama murmuring gently._

_But it was too late._

_The memory withered away as suddenly as it had appeared, and soon it was too far out of Lance’s reach. He fell to his knees in the middle of the room, could have sworn he had a name right there at the tip of his tongue._

_And then the lights went out._

  
  


_Zoira, present-day_

Here’s something else that could need some clearing up, Lance thought; Keith and him.

So, they were buddies. Or they used to be, it was just a little complicated right now. Lance figured it had all been good and dandy up until about two months ago or so when they landed on a planet called Vivienne (Pidge named it after her pet lizard back on Earth, since the planet had no civilizations, but a lot of small, reptile looking creatures scattering through the fields). Vivienne was also completely _stacked_ with vegetables of all kinds, so the whole team had been out on the fields, harvesting like real life farmers in the humid heat. Lance had shed his shirt as soon as he got the chance and tied it over his head instead as protection from the two stars shining down on them, the arms bundled into two knots at the sides of his head. A _pretty good_ Princess Leia cosplay according to Hunk. As if Lance didn’t already know he was good at making the Leia buns. He had suffered through sunstroke enough times back home to know what to do to avoid it. The _heat_ though, the heat was unbearable. Even Allura was sweating, and she was a _real_ princess _—_ uh _,_ not that Lance thinks princesses can’t sweat. He’s seen Allura battling the sparring bots, he _knows_ how much that girl can sweat—but she was all dressed up in her pretty dress and hair falling in loopy curls behind her back… and then suddenly she morphed into some kind of scarecrow. The heat really didn’t do any wonders for any of them, but Lance tried to help her braid her frizzy hair back into a somewhat containable hairdo anyway.

Lance didn’t even really recall what exactly he’d done that pissed Keith off so much, but he’d obviously done something. Before they landed on Vivienne they’d been joking around and bickered like any other day, and then when they actually started working on the fields, Keith got all huffy and puffy and refused to go anywhere near Lance for the remaining of their stay on the planet. For a day or two before leaving Vivienne, he wouldn’t even talk to Lance, working his ass off on the training deck to avoid him instead, grinding his sharp canines together until they turned blunt whenever they found themselves in the common room at the same time, and then just settled with simply death-glaring at Lance when he realized there really weren’t that many hiding places on a contained area like the castle. Lance had actually started getting worried that they had somehow regressed back to the childish hatred of their first couple of weeks in space, and he was not at all on board with that. It didn’t exactly get any better even when they went back to their usual Voltron schedule. Keith wasn’t as openly hostile as before, but he became more reclusive, wouldn’t talk as much, went on more Blade missions than usual… kind of pulled away whenever Lance plowed forwards. It was as if their friendship, or whatever it was, had been put on hold. And it wasn’t until they arrived here on Aegis that it finally started to feel like it was going to be alright again.

Here on Aegis, the days went by in a blur. It felt almost as if in one moment Lance had been wandering the castle alone in the middle of the night feeling sorry for himself, and the next Keith had made himself a fixed figure at his side again, as if that weird non-fight after Vivienne hadn’t even happened. If he was playing video games against Pidge, Keith would place himself down next to Lance, knees touching and everything, and cheekily point out all the flaws in his fighting and tactics; or at breakfast, he’d suddenly appear on the seat right beside him as if that had been his usual place at the table all along, joining the chatter about what they all got planned for the day or what they wanted for dinner later. Keith doesn’t _chat_. He doesn’t tease _cheekily_. Lance had no idea what this new development of his personality meant, but he wasn’t exactly complaining.

Now, wherever Lance was, Keith was too. Like a package deal.

Even Hunk had noticed, if the pointed looks he’d shoot him every now and then whenever Keith seemed to be a little bit closer than usual was anything to go by. And Keith definitely didn’t shy away from getting close anymore.

”Lance,” the boy in question had shouted one day, and stepped up next to him in one of Atenea One’s endless corridors. Hunk, Pidge and an aegian technician were walking a few paces ahead, discussing whatever brainy nerds liked to discuss. Lance had most definitely slowed down on purpose so he wouldn’t have to contribute to the conversation with awkward nodding and polite smiles. He wasn’t too sure about Keith but there was a big chance he’d done the same tactical maneuver as Lance. Sure, Keith was smart—but he wasn’t _smart_ -smart. He wouldn’t survive a conversation with the brain trio any more than Lance would. That’s something they had in common at least.

”Oh, Keith, hey,” Lance nodded and focused on putting one foot in front of the other, as if he hadn’t been painfully aware of Keith straying closely behind him this whole time. There was an ominous second of silence, as if Keith was charging up for something, that almost had Lance glancing up from his feet when a sudden ” _here_ ,” was the only warning Keith seemed to give him before he shoved his fist right up in Lance’s face.

”Woah, woah— _woah_!” Lance yelped and immediately grabbed his wrist and brought it straight up in the air. They grounded to a halt, the whole thing catching the attention of the little nerd herd in front of them as well. Lance glared at Keith, the offensive fist still high in his grip. ” _Dude_ ,” he said, confused at the sudden attack. Keith looked as chocked as him, mouth gaping, eyes wide-open.

”It’s just a clementine,” he explained, finally, in a raspy half-whisper, his breath hitting Lance’s chin as he spoke. Lance let his eyes drift from Keith’s stunned face, down his arm and to his hand hovering slightly by his hip. The sharp tang of clementine reached his nose about the same time as the pealed fruit registered in Keith’s hand. Lance gulped, looked way up to his other hand. His very naked, glove-less hand… His, uh, very naked, glove-less, clementine piece holding hand that was still firmly clutched in the air. Lance glanced down again, realized Keith was straining on his tippy toes as to not fall right into him.

”Oh,” Lance said, meeting Keith’s eyes, ” _oh_ , uh, that’s… good,” and then promptly dropped his grip of his hand.

And here’s the thing, Lance thought Keith was going to, like, stumble away from him, curse his name and stomp away all grumpily. Maybe glare at him a little, you know, like normal-Keith would have done—but this wasn’t _normal_ -Keith. Nah, this was _oddly-close-and-cuddly-_ Keith who didn’t mind staying exactly where he was, pressed up against Lance of all places.

So, this is what _actually_ happened: Lance dropped his hand like he’d accidentally put his hand on a stove, fully committed to the idea of living off the grid somewhere on an unknown planet for a couple of years until Keith had forgotten about this moment. Keith, however, simply sunk down on his heels now that Lance’s grip wasn’t holding him up anymore, in actual slow-motion, still staring at him. He brought his hand down as well until he had it placed as a little bridge between their chests, eyes never flickering from Lance’s face. Lance could taste the scent of the clementine on his tongue.

”Quick reflex,” Keith said. Lance gulped, very, _very_ conscious of the back of Keith’s hand pressed against his chest, of how _close_ Keith was.

”Thanks,” he’d squeaked.

”Guys? You okay?” Hunk asked then—the very light of Lance’s life, his knight in shining armor, designated savior of devastatingly embarrassing situations, _The_ Hunk.

”Yeah,” Keith breathed again, and took a small step back, still giving Lance that wide eyed look that he couldn’t fucking tell what it was supposed to _mean_.

Lance felt like a balloon that would explode any second.

”Buddy?” Hunk questioned again, a worried tint to his voice. A nervous chuckle exited Lance’s throat—hissing like the balloon had started leaking air—and he turned to his best bud as smoothly as a wilting balloon could turn.

”Yeah, everything’s great,” he’d said, very calm and smooth. _See_ —he could be normal.

Hunk had given him a very pointed look, shook his head at him, and then he’d made sure everyone was turned away from Lance’s very red face and were back on their way through the corridor again. His savior, indeed.

Keith started walking ahead as well, sending swift, curious glances over his shoulder that had Lance’s breath catching in his throat every time they landed on him, until Lance caught up at his side, finally caving into the offered clementine piece that Keith placed into his outstretched hand. It wasn’t really a clementine, but it was small and peelable and sweet, and close enough. Keith kept tearing off every other piece for Lance to munch on, their shoulders brushing occasionally in the narrow corridors, and when the savory juices of the fruit exploded in Lance’s mouth it honestly didn’t even matter that it wasn’t a real clementine.

Lance didn’t think he had ever done as much blushing before as he did that day. Especially not in front of _Keith—_ and it’s not as if it got any better during the week that passed. No, if anything, Keith started behaving even more out of the ordinary. Lance didn’t really trust himself to believe Keith was actually _flirting_ with him—that was simply impossible. Something else was definitely at play here, and Lance was going to find out what.

One night Lance found himself splayed out on the floor down on the bridge, simply lounging, gazing out into the backdrop of Aegis. Sleep evaded him the way he evaded cryo-pod cleaning duty, so he could’t stay mad about being up at three in the morning. It was rather nice, actually. Just looking. Simply being. He’d been humming on something, a song his mama used to hum as she cleaned the kitchen from the catastrophic results of her baking.

_Gracias a la vida_ , _que me he dado tanto._

_Gracias a la vida, mijo,_ she sang, encouraging Lance to sing along, _me ha dado la risa y me ha dado el llanto a_ _sí yo distingo dicha de quebranto, los dos materiales que forman mi canto, y el canto de ustedes que es mi mismo canto._

”What song is that?”

Keith squatted down beside Lance on the floor. Lance yelped, interrupting himself mid humming and stared up at Keith.

”What song?” he said.

Keith frowned.

”The one you just hummed?”

Lance gasped theatrically.

”Oh, _that_ song.” Keith’s eyebrows did something complicated over his hooded eyes and Lance had to look away, back out through the windows and into space, unless he wanted to get stuck like that. ”It’s just some old song my mama used to sing when she cleaned,” Lance explained, waving a hand in the air, blushing furiously at his own awkwardness, ”she said it made it more bearable.”

”It’s nice,” Keith said and turned towards the view as well, leaning back on his hands as he settled down on the floor.

”Thanks,” Lance said, clearing his throat from dust or something.

They spent an infinite amount of time like that, just hanging out on the bridge, looking at the stars far off in the distance. At least it felt like it. Keith’s knee dug into Lance’s ribs, but Keith didn’t seem to notice that they were touching. Lance did, though, oh _man_ , he really did. He wondered how he’d managed to achieve this kind of reverence with Keith again, how he’d gotten to the point where Keith could just come and sit next to him in silence, not even flinching at their closeness, like before Vivienne. Keith, who wouldn’t have been caught dead alone in Lance’s company just a week ago.

”How’s the hand?” Lance said eventually, his unstoppable need to stay in motion effectively blocked by his immovable desire to stay touching Keith, even if it was just by the knee. Filling the empty room with chatter instead seemed the best solution to blow off some pent up steam.

Keith shrugged, brought his hands back from their position on the ground and inspected them in front of him. His gloves covered them from knuckles to wrist.

”They seem fine,” he said.

”So, you’ve officially quit that whole stronger bones business?”

Keith snorted, took his glove off, flexed his hand, once, and then he offered it to Lance.

”I’m plenty strong already,” he said, grinning, as if he was challenging Lance without even setting a definite goal. Lance gawked at Keith, and then at the hand. And then he reached for him, his own hand joining Keith’s in the air—except, he didn’t grab it, didn’t try his strength, didn’t actually _want_ to compete about whatever anymore. Instead, he nudged Keith’s hand until they pressed their palms together, Lance’s dark skin capsuling the pale hand in his. Keith looked down at him, eyebrows furrowed and confused.

”What are you—”

”I have longer fingers than you,” Lance interrupted, surprising even himself, as if hiding behind the pretense of competing was the only thing that allowed him to touch Keith like this.

Keith stared at their hands. His face turning a faint shade of angry red before he looked back out into space.

”It’s not a competition,” he muttered, pulled his hand back, put it down in his lap and let his other hand graze its fingers across his palm, unconsciously, as if he could feel the imprint of Lance’s hand on his skin once again.

That single gesture caved it’s way right into Lance’s chest.

This, Keith finding him on the bridge in the middle of the night, or Lance walking in on him reading through the same book about Galra history for the fifth time in the castle library, bumping into each other in hallways, in Zoira’s streets, on the training deck, kitchen, conference rooms, lunch-breaks—this, either actively seeking out each other or accidentally spending time together happened over and over again, until Lance’s confusion about Keith started turning into normalcy. This was familiar. This was routine. This was safe.

This particular day, however, was a bit of an anomaly. Lance hadn’t seen Keith for the entire morning— _not_ that he’d been worried or anything. Keith was allowed to go wherever he pleased without Lance hanging onto his every step. He’s his own person, Lance knew that. He _admired_ that, really. It was just unusual, is all. Very strange. He hadn’t been at breakfast, and not on the bridge as Lance and Hunk strolled in to get their daily assignments from Allura, or at the meeting with lieutenant Eermes, or even at the guided tour through Zoira’s old town streets. Lance had been forced to bite back the constant question about where Keith was the whole morning—he wasn’t worried. He _wasn’t_. He was just curious.

”I’ll see you at lunch, yeah?” Hunk said as their paths split in two in front of them. The tour of Zoira’s old town had ended, and now they’d been let loose to explore for themselves, and evidently Hunk would rather walk alone than endure one more second of Lance’s sulking. Jokes on him, because it only made Lance sulk even more when he saw where Hunk had gestured for him to go; his path looked like the alien-city-equivalent to a road you definitely don’t want the protagonist of a Disney movie to walk down, far more gloomy and run-down than Hunks, which smelled like freshly baked bread and had the pleasant sound of Aegian music playing in the distance.

”Yeah,” Lance sighed, ”so… uh, do you think—I mean, can you—”

”I’ll tell you right away if I see Keith anywhere, buddy, don’t worry,” Hunk said and patted Lance on the shoulder. Lance almost tipped forwards.

” _What_ —” he spluttered. ”I’m not—that wasn’t _at all_ what I was going to say—”

”Uh huh,” Hunk hummed and started walking down the street to the right, with the birds chirping and sunbeams beaming. ”Sure thing, Lance,” he sing sang over the shoulder.

”I _wasn’t_!” Lance yelled, feeling utterly betrayed, but Hunk had already walked around the first corner, leaving Lance completely by himself. ”I wasn’t,” Lance muttered again, and wasn’t really sure who he was trying to convince this time, and kicked some dirt across the ground. The gravel went a bit further than he’d planned though, and richly dusted someone’s flowerbeds pale red. He didn’t stick around long after that.

Lance’s street was awful—just, awful. It was dirty, and the walls were crumbling, and the absence of any sign of life so very imminent—and yet, Lance kept throwing glances over his shoulder because he could’ve sworn he heard footsteps echoing behind him that weren’t just his own. He’d only managed walking for a minute or two when a sudden scrambling noise erupted through the empty alleyway.

” _Hey_ —” Lance yelped, as a trashcan looking thingy suddenly rolled across the street, stopping right in front of his feet. Lance stared down at the trashcan, and then followed the trail in the gravel from where it had appeared. ”Uh, hello?” he yelled again, a bit more collected this time, towards the corner further down the street. It was too dark to really see anything, but Lance could’ve sworn he saw a shadow moving. There was no answer what so ever to his greeting, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t some kind of weird Aegian monster hiding over there. Lance twisted to look around him for literally anyone else that would feel up to finding out what the fuck was hiding there in the back of the alley.

”Uh,” he began again, gulped rather loudly and dried some hand sweat on his armor. Then he took one step closer, ”hey,” he said, like an actual idiot, ”I’m Lance, Blue Paladin of Voltron, and, uh, we’re here to help, so, please don’t eat me or anything, I promise I’m really disgust- _AH_ —”

Out from the darkness came a child, rolling out just like the trashcan—and, listen, Lance is _not_ afraid of children, okay? Lord knows he’s been around enough of children all his life that he’s become immune to them and all the chaos that they so happily bring with them. But this—this _trashcan-look-alike—_ was _not_ normal. What came rolling out of the shadows was something that definitely looked like a child, albeit an Aegian one, except for the fact that it was covered completely in dirt and a red liquid that Lance’s brain just absolutely refused to acknowledge as anything other than paint.

Anyways, paint or not, Lance shrieked—yeah, _shrieked_ , and jumped about three feet up in the air and almost collided with the wall behind him in his haste to get away from the thing that just rolled out towards him.

The child, or whatever, came to a stop there in the middle of the street, face angled down to the ground where Lance couldn’t see it.

”What the fuck,” Lance whispered when the child didn’t move after that. ”What the fucking _fuck_.”

He stared at the kid. Stared until he felt like his eyes must have dried out. Stared as if the child would decompose if he as much as blinked. Stared so long and hard that, eventually, the kid couldn’t hold its breath anymore, and so a gasping inhale was what came to reveal a very still alive child playing dead in the middle of the street. Lance gawked at the utter theatrics of it all.

What the fuck was Lance supposed to do now?

”Hello?” he tried again. No answer. Lance frowned. ”I know you’re not dead,” he continued.

After a few seconds of waiting out of pure spite to see who would break first, the kid finally moved. A chubby little arm went straight up in the air, only to fall limp down on the ground again. Lance is man enough to admit he did yelp at the sudden movement, his back yet again pressed into the wall—but then he got kind of annoyed.

”Hey, what the—stop _doing_ that, it’s super freaky—”

”You’re supposed to see if I’m dead.”

Lance gawked again at the kid, at the fact that somehow Lance hadn’t expected them to sound so… young. He shook his head.

”No, I—I know you’re not _dead_ , Jesus Christ, c’mon—”

”You’re _supposed_ to check for a _pulse_ ,” the kid said again, obviously annoyed with Lance’s lack of reaction.

”A pulse,” Lance repeated. And then the kid lifted its head from the ground to properly glare at him.

”Are you sure you’re really the Blue Paladin?” they asked, long green-ish hair tussled into looking like rotten cotton candy.

Lance bristled at the underlying insult—how _dare_ they?—and pushed himself off the wall to take two really determined steps over to the kid and sink down on one knee. ” _This_ Blue Paladin is gonna check your damn pulse better than anyone’s ever checked your pulse before, kid, just watch,” he muttered and reached for the very conveniently placed arm on the ground. The kid immediately put their head down on the ground again, playing dead like their entire future acting career was at stake. Lance snorted and put two fingers at their wrist, focusing on just finding the pulse… and, uh… hopefully… sometime today… maybe… what the _fuck?_

”… are you sure you’re not dead?” Lance asked after a few too many moments of not finding anything even remotely pulse-like, and tugged at the arm… just to make sure.

The kid started laughing. Like a goddamn maniac.

Lance still had no clue what was protocol in this kind of situation. Like, he knew they were supposed to look out for and help the Aegians with pretty much whatever they would need help with—and if they found dead children on the street it was a definite sign that something was wrong and needed the Paladins’ expertise… except this child was not dead—at least, Lance thought they weren’t?

”You don’t have a pulse,” he pointed out, not really sure if the kid knew about this.

”You have too much pulse,” the kid retorted.

Lance had no idea what to say to that.

”I’m fucking hallucinating,” he ended up with, and brought his hand up to his forehead to check if he’d gotten a fever or something, falling backwards on the ground and laying down next to them. ”Is this a dream? Am _I_ dead?”

The kid sat up suddenly, staring down at him.

”Fuck is a swearword,” they said. Lance sighed.

”Look,” he said, eyes closed, a headache steadily coming on, ”I have no idea what your deal is—but you really shouldn’t just roll out of dark alleys and play dead just to scare people, that’s super fu—uh, super _weird_ —and I bet your parents wouldn’t like it if they knew about it, so why don’t you just tell me where you live and then I can bring you home and—”

”My parents are dead,” the kid said, and then, you know, just to clarify, ”actually dead.” Lance opened his eyes and looked over at the kid. They were playing around with the gravel, drawing stick figures.

”That’s— _Jesus_ , okay. Well, then, you must have someone who looks out for you, right? And they’re probably worried about where you are right now, you know, pulse or not.”

No answer. Lance sat up and watched as they kept drawing meaningless things on the ground, completely ignoring him.

”Uh, okay,” he said, sighing for a _second_ time and tried to figure out what to do now. He leaned his head in his palm and started tapping his finger to his temple.

”Here—I made you look pretty,” the kid said then and pointed towards one of the tallest of the stick figures. Lance frowned.

”I do _not_ have that big of a head.”

The kid tilted their own head and glanced up at him, and then down at the drawing again.

”Fine, it can be your helmet then,” they said, as if that made him feel any better. They sat like that for a while, on the ground, in a dark alley right by the most run-down street he’s ever seen. What was a kid doing alone in this kind of place, anyway?

”What’s your name?” he asked, after a moment of watching the drawing grow several feet bigger on the ground and trying to figure out what to do.

”Ada,” they said, not even looking up at him. Lance hummed.

”Are you a girl?” he asked, because they kind of looked like a girl, with the long hair and all. That made the kid look up at him.

”For now,” she said and then went back to focusing on her drawing.

”Cool.” Lance nodded. ”My name’s Lance. I’m a boy, uh, forever, I guess?”

”Cool,” Ada said. Lance frowned, tapping his finger away.

”Okay, Ada,” he said, finally, all business now, and got up from the ground and grabbed onto her leg as he went up. She shrieked in delight at suddenly being lifted into the air. Lance stared her right in the eye as she dangled there, upside-down. ”Let’s have a little chat.”

”You’re _crazy_ ,” she giggled, as if that was the greatest compliment in the world.

”Where do you live?” he interrogated, actually growing kind of worried about how easily he could lift her up. She weighed like only slightly more than Veronica’s old guinea pig.

”Can you throw me in the air?” she wondered, the manic laughter turning into a manic smile as she successfully avoided his question.

”Uh,” Lance stalled, ”I mean, I guess?”

”Can you throw me… now? Please? Pretty please? Pretty please with a _cherry_ on top?”

Lance gaped at her. Where had she even heard that expression before? What kind of weird language-teaching-thingamabob had Coran cooked up for them?

”No?” he said, because he was not about to throw her in the air and risk dropping her on the ground and actually kill her, for real this time. The kid frowned, which looked kind of funny like this, upside-down and all.

”You’re no fun, Blue Paladin,” she muttered and crossed her arms over her chest.

” _Please_ , just tell me who to drop you off to, I’m literally begging you,” Lance pleaded, not even caring about being the adult in this. He did not become a war hero just to be forced into baby-sitting again. No thank you. He’s done with his baby-sitting days.

Ada glared at him, once again refusing to answer him.

”Really?” he huffed. She turned her head away from him in objection. ”Wow, _super_ mature—”

” _Lance?_ ”

Lance whirled around at his name. Ada screamed at suddenly soaring through the air and started laughing like a crazy person again when she just kind of dangled slightly back and forth as Lance came to stop at the sight of Keith—and some other Aegian.

”Oh,” he said, ” _Keith_ , fancy meeting you here!”

Keith stared at him, and then at the Aegian child in his grip who was currently using him like a swinging set, and then back up at Lance again. Lance stared right back at him, Ada’s manic smile spreading onto him like some kind of disease.

”Hey, Lance,” Keith answered, semi-normal. Lance was kind of impressed that he’d managed to get his shit together so fast. ”Uh, this is Zeevs.”

Lance’s gaze drifted over to the alien that stood right next to Keith… like, _right_ next to him. Elbows touching and all. They were tall, and took half a step forwards, their hands stretched out as if they were afraid that Lance would just throw Ada at them or something.

They looked kind of familiar.

”Blue Paladin,” Zeevs greeted with a nod, and then, slightly more strained, ”please, put down the child.”

”No!” Ada screamed at the request and bent up to grab a hold of Lance’s arm, clinging to him like a koala. Lance staggered forwards slightly at the sudden shift in weight, looked at his arm and grimaced.

” _Ugh_ , what even is this?” he complained and tried to shake her off when the red goo that stained her whole body smeared onto his suit.

”It’s my own _blood_ —” Lance gave Ada a glare ”— _fine_ , it’s just mud…” but it didn’t stop the smart-ass smirk from spreading across her face.

”That’s disgusting,” he said. Ada shrugged. Lance waved his arm around again, but she clung to him as if her life depended on it.

”I _must_ inquire you to _stop_ ,” Zeevs said again, face turning a worrying amount of sparkling purple. Lance frowned and reached his arm out towards them.

”Why don’t you have a go at it then,” he said and gestured for the aegian to help him get rid of the pest that had attached herself to his limb. Zeevs looked critically at Lance’s ruined, muddy armor, as if they were about just as keen as Lance to get all smeared in it, and didn’t move an inch to help him, as predicted.

” _Ada_ ,” they said instead, trying to catch her attention. Lance frowned at the familiar way they said her name, and felt a strange mix between suspicious and relieved. ”Did you run away again?”

At this Ada roared, like some kind of animal, and let go of Lance’s arm, landing on the ground pretty smoothly—at least compared to Lance’s desperate flailing at the sudden imbalance of weight. She brushed some of her wild hair away from her face and walked over to sit down by the drawing she’d made on the ground earlier, completely ignoring Zeevs question.

Lance stared in abject horror at the mess that his arm had become.

”I apologize, Blue Paladin,” Zeevs said again, ”Ada has a bit of a _discipline_ issue.”

Lance’s frown deepened.

”Who are you again?” he asked, rather nastily. The way Zeevs talked about Ada, as if she was some kind of problem to handle, really did not sit right with him. Zeevs straightened at his sharp question and, to Lance’s surprise, bowed slightly.

”As the Red paladin said already, my name is Zeevs—I am a guard stationed in Atenea One,” they explained, cold eyes meeting Lance’s. And, suddenly, Lance realized why they felt so familiar. It was that same guard that he saw the first day down there when Lieutenant Eermes showed them the way to the observation control room to meet General Aelix. The same guard he’d seen chatting with Keith a bit here and there every time they went down to Atenea One. Lance’s eyes drifted towards Keith, almost automatically, who’d found himself lounging against the building.

”He was showing me around town,” Keith added helpfully, when he finally managed to meet Lance’s eyes.

”The _whole_ morning?” Lance asked, and immediately bit his own tongue when the very thing he really did _not_ want to say flew out of his mouth. Keith shrugged, looking away from him again. Something sharp tugged in Lance’s stomach.

”I offered to show Keith around and let him know what areas should need more focus as the Great Wave nears, it’s truly been a pleasure to have spent so much time in his company,” Zeevs continued, directing a discreet smile towards Keith as he talked, as if they were sharing some kind of moment that Lance was not a part of. A muscle in Lance’s jaw snapped.

”Lovely,” he said and forced his mouth into somewhat of a grin as well.

”Oh, yes, very lovely, although the reason for the tour wasn’t as pleasant, you see, a lot of these old town districts aren’t really inhabited as far as the state is concerned, so we have no idea of knowing if there are any real citizens here or just _squatters_ , which will make it harder for all of us to evacuate these areas once the Great Wave comes—we’ve been trying to count every citizen just to make sure that we won’t forget anyone and it’s been very difficult for obvious reasons…” Zeevs continued, except Lance had already stopped listening when he’d spat out the word ’squatters’ the way he did.

To be fair, Lance does struggle with keeping his concentration unless he’s interested in the current subject (and sometimes even then), _and_ Zeevs seemed to be kind of a douchebag, so, he didn’t exactly feel bad about already checking out of the conversation and just kind of nodding and humming every now and then. Lance was usually a pretty good listener… well, mostly… but just as Zeevs really started getting into whatever he was talking about, it just so happened that his attention had begun traveling towards Keith—as it usually does—who’d casually strolled up to where Ada was minding her business.

”Is that really mud?” he heard Keith mutter, and saw him just about to reach out to poke at some of the red goo on Ada’s forehead, as if she was some inanimate object that just happened to stand next to him, when Ada suddenly decided she was an animal again and angled her head to bite his finger off.

” _Holy shit_ —” Keith yelped and immediately pulled this hand back as she hissed at him, like the little monster she was. Except Keith only stared at her and ”are those your _real teeth?”_ he inquired again, as excited as Keith could sound, and crouched down to look at her pointy canines, learning absolutely _nothing_ from before.

Ada looked dumbfounded at first, and then kind of as if she was contemplating biting him again, but in the end she seemed to accept that she had made a new friend and gave Keith the biggest, most startling smirk she could manage so Keith could see all of her teeth at once.

Lance gawked at them.

” _As I was saying,_ ” Zeevs snapped and urged his gaze back to him. Once he had Lance’s attention again, he cleared his throat. ”Ada needs to be brought back to the orphanage, I think she’s had enough of fun today.”

”Can one really have _enough_ of fun?” Lance said, as if Zeevs take on the situation actually had any real value, and glared at him as politely as he could.

”Yes,” Zeevs answered, and now _he_ was the one with the nasty tone, ”don’t you have a round to finish, anyway? Or are you just going to follow the Red Paladin around now that you’ve finally leashed onto him again?”

Lance actually staggered backwards at the sudden turn of conversation.

”I— _what,”_ Lance spluttered, completely blanched _“_ —that’s not—what are you—I don’t even know what you’re talking about,” he finally managed. Zeevs smiled at him, way too satisfied with the way the situation played out.

”Oh, sorry,” he said, but he didn’t sound sorry at all, ”perhaps I’ve misunderstood, are you two _not_ together?”

Lance’s mouth was gaping wide at the pure disrespect of it all. Why this random guard, who he’s never even spoken to before, would be so antagonistic all of a sudden was definitely on the top three of stuff Lance has no clue how they happened—like, _sure_ , maybe Lance had been a bit of an asshole at first, but come on, there’s no reason to bring his relationship with Keith into this. Uh. Whatever relationship there was to even bring in.

Lance threw a quick glance over at Keith again, just to make sure he wasn’t listening to their conversation, and then when he confirmed that, no, he wouldn’t make a fool of himself in front of Keith any more than he’d already done today, he took one step closer to Zeevs.

”Okay, what is your problem exactly?” he demanded, very Keith-like if he gets to say so himself. Zeevs startled, only slightly, as if surprised by Lance’s sudden approach, but didn’t really show any other inkling of being intimidated.

”So you _are_ together?” he simply asked, that stupid smile never leaving his dumb, sparkly face.

”No, we are not,” Lance said then, a hiss through his teeth, because he was not about to walk into this kind of trap willingly. But, if anything, his answer only seemed to make the satisfied smile grow on Zeevs lips.

”I see,” he said, ”then perhaps you should leave him alone. It’s really rather pathetic to see you follow him around like a lost baby yupper.”

A burning blush started spreading across Lance’s face, and before he even got to respond Zeevs had called out to Keith and Ada, telling them that they were going to bring Ada home. Lance stood frozen on the ground, the warm flush on his skin clashing horribly with the sudden dread that collected at the top of his spine.

”We’ll let the Blue Paladin go back to his duties now,” Zeevs explained and walked up to Ada, taking her hand and pulling her up from the ground, suddenly not caring at all about the mud.

”But—no, I wanna go with _Lance_ —” Ada complained, her head whipping around to look at Lance with her huge eyes, all sadly. Keith also looked at Lance, eyebrows furrowed and that cute wrinkle of confusion making itself known.

”You’re coming with me and Keith,” Zeevs said again clutching her wrist harder when she started straining against him. Ada looked up at Keith, and then back to Zeevs, reaching her hand out for the Red Paladin instead.

”I wanna hold _his_ hand,” she said, pure defiance in her voice. Keith still hadn’t looked away from Lance, until her sudden declaration startled him into focusing on her.

”Uh,” he said, scrambling for any kind of acceptable reaction, and it had Lance wondering if Keith’s ever really been around children before. Ada simply waved her hand impatiently until Keith had no choice but to grab onto it.

”Okay… uh, I got her?” Keith said, looking up at Zeevs for confirmation.

”She’s not an animal,” Lance snorted, which had Keith turning towards Lance in a more characteristic glare, instead of looking so adorably confused.

”I _know_ that,” he snapped, at the same time as Ada roared again, very animal-like. Keith looked appropriately alarmed.

”We should really start to head back if you want to make it to lunch, Keith,” Zeevs said then, impatiently tapping his foot on the ground. Lance narrowed his eyes at him.

”Yeah, and Ada should really eat something too,” he added. Zeevs smiled politely at him, which, of course, wasn’t that polite at all.

”Of course,” he nodded. ”Let’s go, shall we?” he said and gestured for them all to start walking. Keith took a step towards Zeevs, only Ada absolutely refused to move.

”No—” she whined, ” _wait_ ,” and then she started dragging Keith across the ground until they both arrived by Lance’s feet. Lance gulped at the, awfully re-occurring, sudden closeness of Keith in front of him, and let his eyes drift down to Ada’s huge eyes.

”You’ll still visit me, right?” she asked, fumbling with her hair, and Lance could actually feel his heart breaking in two. ”I didn’t mean to ruin your suit—I just wanted to _play_ —”

Lance sunk down on his knee and brought her into a hug. Muddy suit be damned.

”I’ll visit you the first thing tomorrow, okay?” Lance whispered into her hair, and then pulled away enough to see her face.

”Promise?” she asked.

” _Ada_ ,” Zeevs called from somewhere far away. Lance ignored him.

”I promise,” he said. She smirked then, widely, and then nodded, fiercely.

”I’ll make sure he gets there,” Keith said then, and tugged at Ada’s hand. She looked up at him, and then back towards Lance, and then at Keith again, as if to confirm that they were both speaking the truth.

”Okay,” she said, finally, and it was a kind of trust that Lance _would_ fight wars to keep intact.

”Bye then, Ada, I’ll see you soon,” Lance said as they turned to walk back through the street the same way they’d arrived.

”Bye, Lance!” Ada shouted and waved. Keith also turned to say good bye, but Zeevs called his name instead and urged them to walk faster.

Lance got up from the ground, dusted some of the dirt away from his knees, and didn’t feel as bad about being left alone on these streets anymore. The dirt and the crumbling buildings and the silence didn’t bother him like it did when he first arrived. He had other things to worry about now, much more _annoying_ things—like Zeevs, for example.

Lance couldn’t believe Keith would deliberately hang out with that guy. He also didn’t understand why Zeevs would imply that Keith and Lance were together, only to throw Lance’s—recently _debatable—_ unrequited crush right in his face. Zeevs didn’t even _know_ Keith! Not the way Lance did, at least… except… _did_ Lance know Keith? He can admit that he hadn’t been exactly keeping up with Keith these past couple of weeks, and Lance still had no idea what was going on inside that mulleted head of his. The flirty banter, the constant companionship, the sudden absence and the avoiding looks didn’t add up. The push and the pull that had Lance dangling somewhere in the middle. Keith was an enigma, if anything, as far as Lance was concerned.

What if Zeevs was right? What if Keith thought Lance was, like, clingy or something?

Lance had been more touchy-feely with Keith lately, absolutely, but only because Keith had let him be. An arm slung over his shoulders here, a poke in the ribs there, sitting next to each other at dinner, grabbing onto wrists to pull closer, calling him things like _Keithy-boy_ and walking together through the corridors in the middle of the night… it was mutual—at least Lance had thought it was.

Or… maybe… uh oh, maybe Lance _was_ too clingy? Maybe Zeevs was _right_. Maybe it’s less _Keith and Lance, a package deal_ and more _wherever Keith goes, Lance follows_.

The very same dread that collected at Lance’s spine earlier suddenly bursted down his back, like a cracked egg, and the daunting road ahead of him back to Atenea One grew infinitely longer.

  
  


_Castle of Lions, present-day_

  
  


Lance’s dad worked a lot. He used to be gone for months on end at the tip of his prime piloting—that one time he went to Mars it was entire years. Luis didn’t even know his own father until he was _three_. It really used to throw Lance into tantrums a lot as a child—you know, the whole not-having-his-dad-around thing. Lance’s dad was an instructor at the Garrison his last few years, a retired pilot, renown for being on the Ares crew for the first mission to Mars. It was a prestigious title, so now in hindsight Lance could kind of forgive him. Five children, a big house with an even bigger mortgage, a wife with hospital bills and student debt to pay. The man did what he felt he had to do to keep them afloat.

It didn’t change the past though. It didn’t change the fact that none of the McClain kids really knew their dad other than the retelling of him: _the Respected Instructor, the Caring Husband, the Brave Astronaut_. The version that everyone else but them seemed to know.

( _The Devoted Father_ had always been a bedtime story they got told late at night. Like some kind of fairytale of a father Lance could only dream of.)

It was Lance’s tío who took on the job as the main male role model for Lance during his childhood. Before Lance managed to forgive his dad, long before he knew anything about Shiro’s accomplishments and heroics as a pilot, it was his tío who bought him his first set of glow in the dark stars to put up on his ceiling. He'd lifted him up on his shoulders so Lance could reach to stick them up himself. He was the first person who told him that _the sky is not a limit, but an opportunity._

His tío was great that way, with sayings and idioms and metaphors and what not. They didn’t always make sense but that was alright. Lance thought he was the smartest person he’d ever met and that was enough for him.

He remembered one summer evening after his ninth birthday when they laid down on the beach, a fire burning a few feet away, sparks flying like flickers of light across the sky and coalescing with the stars above them. His mama was carrying Luis back inside to put him to bed, Marco was practically asleep as well in their abuela’s arms after the hectic day behind them. Today they had celebrated Lance’s father, tío Jaime’s brother, abuela’s son, for getting the opportunity to travel to space again. Lance didn’t really understand what it all meant, he was just happy that they got to eat hamburgers and play on the beach for an entire day. After a while though, he did notice how his dad never came home to eat hamburger’s with them, not that it was that unusual, but that thought quickly evaporated as his big sister Rachel surprised them with her new college boyfriend in tow.

Lance was happy, until he realized this party meant his dad wouldn’t come home for another couple months. How this was something to celebrate, he never understood.

He’d been grumpily digging into the ground with a stick when his tío sat down next to him in the sand, all their friends and extended family leaving one by one, the night finally coming to an end. Lance didn’t bother with saying goodbye to anyone, but he couldn’t just ignore tío Jaime when he told him to lay down and look up at the sky with him—just like they used to do in Lance’s room, staring up at the glowing stars on his ceiling.

_He’s up there, Leandro, missing us from inside a rocket ship_ , tío Jaime said, pointing straight up, as if they’d be able to actually see his dad from here. Lance’s eyes followed the direction of his finger, but all he could see was the dark sky and how infinitely big it is.

_Not missing us enough to stay,_ Lance had mumbled, and he thinks tío Jaime noticed the angry tilt of his eyebrows, the trembling of his lower lip, because here he said something that would come to stick with Lance for years—a tiny print to the back of his eyelids, a constant reminder whenever he closed his eyes.

_It doesn’t matter where in the sky he is right now_ , he’d said, sounding way too serious and grown up for talking to an nine year old, effectively catching Lance’s full attention, _home is where the heart is,_ _and_ _your dad will always find his way back as long as our hearts keep beating._

And Lance thought it made total sense. He could find his dad’s heart in the shabby treehouse in their backyard. He could see his heart in the pictures on the walls. Hear his heartbeat in the vinyls his mama plays in the evening, humming to the tune of their wedding song. Home is where the heart is, and as long as his mama dances in the living room to the memories of a decade long marriage, as long as he and his siblings wrestle down the stairs, and save a chair at breakfast for their dad even though he’s not even in the same atmosphere, then he will always have a place to call home. A place to come back to. A place to belong.

Now, Lance was pretty sure giving away your heart wouldn’t be as straining and time consuming as it might’ve sounded, but Lance has only ever known what it’s like to trace his father’s footsteps, so at first, in the very beginning of this space journey, Lance thought that if home really was where the heart is then he must have left it in Varadero, just like his dad. With his family and his friends—and if he had to get even more specific about a location he’d have to say he must have left his heart in his room. Where the sun rays peak through his sheer curtains in the early morning hours, where he could lay spread out like a starfish on his sheets, staring up at the glow in the dark stars in his ceiling. _That’s where I feel the most at home_ , Lance thought with familiarity and longing—until the swooshing sound of the doors in the castle-ship caught Lance’s attention briefly, a flicker of black hair, of pale skin in the corner of Lance’s eye and then, well—that’s at least where he _imagined_ he’d feel most at home. Only now, he couldn’t help the nagging voices that wonder if a heart really can survive being separated from its host body from entire light-years away, and then—

_Then_ he looked over at Keith. Keith who just walked past him right now to sit only a few feet away from him on the couch, settling into the cushions all snuggly and warm, reading lazily on his holo pad, and Lance thought how nice—how _easy_ even—it would be to have his heart settled right here in the Castle of Lions.

Maybe his tío was right about home being where the heart is, but it was never specified who’s heart it gotta be. Lance remembered the times he’d be gently hushed from crying, cradled into his mama’s chest and feeling so content, so grounded, just from hearing her heartbeat. And now—now he only needed to look at Keith, look at his red cheeks, still flushed form the shower after a training session, look at the way his chest raised slowly as he breathed, simply think of the times he’s fantasized of trailing his fingers over Keith’s pointy wrists and feel the faint beating of his pulse—and Lance knew that this was the home he was traveling light years for.

“What,” Keith said and looked up at him, strands of hair covering his suspicious eyes. Lance grinned, buried both of his naked feet under Keith’s thigh.

“’s cold,” he mumbled and settled further into the couch. Keith put the holo-pad down in his lap.

“Then you should’ve brought your stupid slippers,” he said, and shoved Lance’s legs off the couch, the rest of him sliding down with it. Lance gasped theatrically and remained lying on the ground until he saw Keith peeking his head out over the edge of the couch cushion to look down on him.

“Help,” Lance chuckled, in too good of a mood to even attempt sounding mad, and reached out a hand to get pulled up. Keith glanced at the hand briefly, a tiny, _wonderful_ smile hiding at the corners of his mouth.

“Help yourself,” he answered, got off the couch and stepped right over Lance to get out of there. Lance’s eyes followed him as if glued to his very skin, his head digging into the floor at the weird upside-down angle it caused him to tilt in, and gave Keith a few seconds of head start—and then he was up and running, laughing and shouting at Keith that he’d _better watch his fucking back_ , and he could hear Keith’s own laughter travel through the hallways like the lines on a map, way ahead of him.

And that’s just how it had always been, hadn’t it?

Keith had been kicked out of the Garrison, before Lance even had the chance to really talk to him more than few stuttered words. He left the team and went with the Blade without even discussing it with anyone of them first. Just like that. Like they were tiny speed bumps on an otherwise empty road. Like there was nothing that stopped Keith from running over them and continue over the horizon until they couldn’t even see him anymore.

Keith had places to go, and Lance trailed after him as if tethered to a lifeboat. Wasn’t that exactly what Zeevs had said? Lance didn’t think he was ashamed of that, at least, not the way Zeevs insinuated he should’ve been. He supposed Keith had always been sort of a North Star for Lance, a common denominator that he never managed to figure out, until now. Lance could only hope he’d be able to catch up before the day comes where Keith goes too far, before he leaves Lance teetering without direction, heartbroken and homeless.

It was a disconcerting feat. A lot of the times trying to catch up to Keith felt like trying to catch up to the hand counting seconds on a clock—a never ending chase that could go on forever—and _then_ Lance remembered Zeevs smiling towards Keith that day in Zoira’s backstreets, remembered his blatant _interest_ , and figured that maybe that clock was ticking a bit faster than he’d first thought. That maybe, if history was anything to go by, Keith was _already_ heading somewhere Lance couldn’t follow. It was only a question of whether or not Lance was willing to crash and burn just for the slight _chance_ of making it in time.

If you asked Hunk—resident best friend to the probable car wreck—Lance could’ve turned off the highway and ditched the stupid race with Keith a long time ago, and that he’d just decided he didn’t want to, like some kind of emotional masochist. Apparently ’wherever Keith goes, Lance follows’ just wasn’t a valid argument to stay, according to him. But if you asked Lance, there was simply no other road that made the cut. And if there ever had been anyone that could’ve lured Lance onto another path, that could even _compete_ with the thrill Lance got from chasing Keith across the pavement, they sure weren’t there anymore. Not that Lance even would have noticed. He was too busy not losing track of Keith to even look back, anyway.

Hunk did have a point about one thing though: Lance probably _should_ stop all of this, take his foot off the gas pedal, quit the race, start bicycling instead or something, if he knew what was best for himself. The road was long, and bumpy, and entering a race without even knowing if he had the fuel to finish it was pure stupidity. But the lure of the goal was too big for him to ignore, and now, after spending so much time around Keith and learning more about him, Lance could almost _taste_ what might be waiting for him at the end of the road.

And that tiny hint of hope growing somewhere deep in Lance’s chest made this whole thing so much harder to resist.

_Zoira, present-day_

Lance had just finished his usual round through the city, the same route he’s been taking for the past few weeks since they got here, and felt particularly happy.

On every new planet they visited Lance had always found a great pleasure in getting to know the people he was working along with, and greeting the civilians living in Zoira, who would need the most help getting underground, was no exception. Walking around the streets was the best part of the job, guaranteed—not that Lance just strolled about and chatted with strangers all day long. It really was a lot of work to move a whole city underground. More work than Lance even could imagine. He'd thought a planet where it floods for every thousand years or so would be more prepared for this kind of thing, and yet a surprising number of people only knew the life above ground, living in the same box-shaped, red houses as their ancestors did before them. Lance pondered this a lot as he passed by the seemingly happy-go-lucky Aegians who lived up here in Zoira.

Although their surroundings looked rather plain and monotonous at first glance, it truly was a very animated city with exuberant people crowding the streets. Lance didn’t think he’d missed greeting a single person, as they all looked up in curious glances and warm smiles when he walked past them. If anything, Zoira and its inhabitants only seemed to come even more alive the further you got to the center of the city. Wherever you looked there was stalls selling everything from shiny tourist trinkets to weirdly shaped fresh fruit, and it reminded Lance too much of the market they went to every Saturday back home. In every step, every cobble-stone, Lance could feel a heartbeat running through the streets, a pulse raising alongside him; people bargaining over new purchases and children’s laughter carrying over the scattered city-life noises.

Zoira was like a creature, living and thriving.

And Lance, of all people, should’ve really understood why the population of a planet that floods every thousand years refuses to hide away underground when all of _this_ lied waiting right above the surface.

At some point in the afternoon Lance found himself walking around in one of the calmer districts of Zoira—a family neighborhood, where children play on swing sets and slides, only few of the things that had weirdly turned out to be universal—that he stumbled upon on one of the first days of his rounds. The people in this particular neighborhood were welcoming and kind, and after realizing they had been frequently visited by the Blue paladin started to offer him enough food to last another lifetime stuck in Blue, so Lance came back here as often as he could. After making it a point to drop by after every round he’d finally caved and found the perfect parking spot for Blue only a block away today, just so he wouldn’t have to walk all the way back to the outskirts of Zoira to get her. Also the Aegians loved the lions, so Lance thought he was doing them all a favor by bringing her into the city. Himself included.

He was just about to step in and say hello to one of the caretakers at the daycare center, where most of the kids from this district resided while their parents focused on the move underground, when a choir of shrieking voices called out his name across the playground behind him. Lance turned right in time to get an armful of Aegian children, clinging to his chest plate, patting his helmet in search for a way to get it off.

”Up! Up! Up!” they chanted in unison and Lance tried his absolute best to comply.

”Oof,” he grunted at the sudden weight on his shoulder as one kid in particular figured climbing up on top of him was a fun idea. ”Hey— _hey_ , don’t touch that!” he yelped and immediately grabbed his bayard out of its holster and stretched his arm straight up, as far away from another pair of small, grabby hands as he could.

”Are you okay?” Keith’s amused voice carried over the children’s shrieking, emerging out of nowhere as Lance saw him peeking over the head of the kid currently busy climbing from one side of Lances shoulders to the other—and there went his helmet, passed along the children and away from his head, where it was supposed to be.

”I’m _great_ ,” it came out in another grunt, and Lance tightened his hold of the three children in his embrace, ”Ada just wishes she was as tall as me, is all,” he teased and pinched Ada—who was desperately clinging to his ears—in the side of her ribs.

”I do _not_!” she shrieked in return. Lance tickled her again and snorted at her horrible hissing and roaring in return, before finally looking over at Keith—completely forgetting how to successfully transfer breaths through his airways properly.

It really was unfortunate that this planet was red, because it certainly didn’t help quelling down the almost alien look to the red paladin. If anything, it only enhanced the not-quite-greasy, but glowing sheen to his hair, the too sharp features framing the bags of exhaustion under his eyes, the odd purple spots hiding in the dark grey color of his irises. Keith wasn’t wearing his helmet, the item currently getting drooled on by an aegian baby that he held cradled in his arms. He looked sweaty, and tired—and Lance thought one of the kids must had drawn with an orange crayon on his armor—but none of that really mattered, because on this red, seething planet, light years away from anything Lance has ever known, Keith looked like he had sprung from the ground. A natural phenomena in the making.

And it really, _really_ was unfortunate how this planet only seemed to enhance how entirely fucked Lance was.

”What,” Keith said, a catchphrase by now, eyebrows tilting down in defensiveness at Lance’s staring.

” _Down!_ ” Ada loudly demanded right into Lance’s ear at the same time, and bounced impatiently with absolutely no sense of self-preservation what so ever. Lance cleared his throat and got down on his knee in fear of accidentally dropping one of the kids. Ada scrambled off of his shoulders and strolled away across the playground while the twins, Aertis and Eeten, both stayed huddled around him.

”Nothing, I’m just, uh—just surprised is all,” Lance answered Keith finally, glancing over at Ada to keep an eye on her whereabouts, and immediately cringed at the words coming out of his mouth.

”Surprised of what?” Keith demanded, hoisting the baby up higher on his hip and received a tiny, sticky palm plastered over his cheek and a gurgle of noises in return. Keith tilted his head down, looked at the baby in all his seriousness as the baby babbled on, and hummed in response—as if the baby had said something worth taking into consideration.

_Surprised of how disgustingly cute he was, that’s what,_ Lance thought.

”You didn’t say you were going to volunteer at the daycare center today,” he explained, instead of saying something stupid like _I didn’t realize I would like the image of you holding a baby as much as I do, but whoop-de-doo, here we are, please be my baby-daddy._

Or, you know, something equally horrifying.

”I don’t report to you,” Keith responded, glancing up at Lance through his bangs. And if this had been a year ago, Lance would have bristled at the comment, huffing and puffing and spitting something nasty back. But now Lance knew Keith, knew this was him trying to be funny, trying to engage in Lance’s banter, in his own awkward, semi-insulting way. It was kind of charming, once you realized it (and Lance sure had realized it.)

”No, I guess you don’t,” he said, in a slow exhale, and it was its own very special brand of resigned softness. A kind of respectful awe, that Lance just couldn’t keep locked inside while around Keith. Almost like how people speak of beautiful places that could kill you. Lance has never been to see the Grand Canyon, but he could imagine what standing there, at what seems like the very edge of Earth, would feel like. The thrill. The affinity. The inescapable, somber mortality of oneself. And maybe a bit like this: the indulgent understanding of how charming Keith really is, and also the sobering realization that comes right after, that he would never waste that charm on Lance with any sense of pursuit. That this was simply the way Keith was; awkwardly charming, and indifferent to whoever happened to witness it.

Experiencing Keith was a bit like staring straight down into an abyss, feel your pulse beating up your throat, and thinking it’s the most beautiful view in the world.

Lance better start watching where he puts his foot next so he doesn’t fall right over the edge.

”So,” Lance cleared his throat, ”you came all the way here just to play with us, huh?”

The twins both started giggling and tugging at his armor impatiently when the word _play_ left his mouth. The eager little shits. Keith smiled slightly.

”Not really, no,” he said.

”Ah, I see, to get drooled on, then?” The slight smile grew into a completely undeniable smirk. Lance smirked right back at him. ”Really? Drool party with the kids?”

”Been looking forward to it all day,” Keith confirmed.

”Sounds fun.”

”It is.”

”Almost wish I was invited.”

”It’s only for the cool kids.”

”Shame.”

”Maybe next time.”

”Yeah?”

”Yeah.”

Lance was having a _really_ good day.

”Play _now_!” Aertis shouted, tugging at his hand. Lance sighed and smiled at Keith, sheepish this time, and then Eeten got impatient as well and started climbing up Lance’s armor again.

”Okay— _okay_ , Jesus, yeah, let’s go—”

And just as they were about to turn, a deafening air horn sound went off, shaking the very ground they stood on in its intensity. Lance immediately crouched down, as if on instinct, and brought the twins into his arms, motioning for them to cover their ears at the loud noise. The blaring continued for a couple of seconds, causing the whole city to freeze until a scrambling clamor of noises joined in just as the sirens abruptly cut off, equally as sudden as they had went off in the first place.

Lance looked up at Keith’s pale face hushing the startled baby in his arms, and then down at his helmet that promptly had been dropped to the ground by the baby in favor of grabbing onto Keith.

” _Paladins, to your lions! I repeat, to your—_ ” he heard the distant sound of Allura’s voice buzzing through the comm in the helmet.

” _Lance_ ,” Keith said, sharply. Lance looked up again, and _there_ , far up there in the sky right above Keith’s left shoulder, he saw a huge galran ship break through the Aegian atmosphere.

For a few horrible seconds, Lance’s body refused to move. He could only watch as the ship grew bigger through the red, hazy sky, as he heard the people around him running around in panic, and General Aelix’ commanding voice sounded through the same speakers as the air horns had blared through earlier. And then Eeten, the younger of the twins, tugged at his hair and whimpered into his chest plate, and Lance realized that this was really _not_ the moment to dissociate.

Keith was already handing over the screaming baby to a caretaker of the daycare center, yelling orders and instructions for the surrounding adults—his natural leader capabilities coming through in the best of times, compared to Lance’s immobility.

”I’ve—I’ve got Blue right here,” he mumbled, almost to himself as the fact made itself reminded in the back of his head. ”I gotta—”

”Where’s Ada?” Aertis cried out, her high-pitched voice cutting through whatever maze Lance’s mind found itself lost in. The caretaker had already grabbed onto her hand, but she refused to walk away from Lance, her bright yellow braids whipping around as she looked for her friend.

_Ada_.

” _Keith—_ ” Lance finally got up from the ground, sound entering his ears in a buzzing stream of white noise, ushered the twins to go with the caretaker, his own gaze flickering all over the place trying to remember where he saw her last— ” _Ada_ , Keith, I have to—”

”You gotta get to Blue,” he said, turning abruptly to tell a couple of Aegian road workers to help bring all the children inside—”there’s no time, Lance—”

”But _Ada_ —”

”I’ll get her!” Keith shouted, both his hands gripping onto Lance’s shoulders suddenly, shaking some sense into him. ”Just go to Blue and make sure the Galra has no chance of even landing that thing—”

”What—and _leave_ you?” Lance shook his head back and forth, the thought of separating as foreign as Aegis itself. ”No, I can’t do that, I can’t just—”

”You have to,” Keith said, his scolding hands coming up to cup Lance’s cheeks as if they had a life of their own, stilling his head enough to lock their eyes, ”you just _have_ to, okay?”

Lance bit his tongue, even if he really didn’t want to, and then the first earth-shattering explosion could be heard in the distance. They both whipped around to gawk at the bright, beaming weapon cutting across the sky. A dark, mushroom shaped cloud grew over where the gigantic laser cannon had hit, all over on the other side of Zoira.

Oh, _no_.

Keith and Lance looked back at each other, two ends of a circuit finally connecting.

Lance had only one last thing on his mind in the midst of the chaos. An impulsive, possibly life-changing decision, and then he lunged forwards to catch Keith’s lips in a kiss _,_ barely giving himself the time to really enjoy it, to savor it—and still it felt like diving into the deepest parts of the ocean by the beach back home, like time coming to a stop and consuming him all at once. As he leaned back, lips brushing slightly and sending little electric shocks between them, Keith gasped, his eyes blown wide, staring as if Lance had opened a portal to another world that Keith had never though would be unlocked.

Lance nodded, felt Keith’s breath on his lips still, a confirmation that that really just happened, of what they had to do next, and then he broke free of Keith’s hands cupping his cheeks and started running through the crowded streets of Zoira. He didn’t think as he ran, knocking into several civilians in his rush, but there wasn’t any time to stop and help them—he had to get to Blue. It was as if he was being controlled by someone else, a puppet on a string, a robot, paving his way over the block until he saw her, mouth open and ready for him to throw himself inside.

”Okay— _okay_ , c’mon, girl, you know the drill,” he panted as he strapped himself to his seat and urged Blue to leave the ground.

_Let’s fucking knock the purple tin-can out of here, yeah?_ he thought, Blue cheering on in the back of his head.

”Lance!” Hunk shouted over the comm. ”Go south—we’re already ahead of you—”

Lance didn’t answer— _couldn’t_ answer as he was too busy catching up on breathing—and only did as he was told and circled around the city to get behind the Galra ship in a half-assed ambush. He pierced through the large mushroom cloud of smoke and when he finally got out on the other side, high up in the sky, Lance saw the complete shambles of Zoira beneath him—the houses and streets only a black scorch mark from up here.

” _No_ ,” he whispered, eyes straying over the deep chasm in the ground where last time he’d looked there had been buildings. Lance knew the evacuation plan by heart, knew exactly which districts had already been left abandoned for Atenea One and where each and every citizen were supposed to go when the sirens blared—and still, now that he was watching the desolation happening right before his eyes, he couldn’t for the life of him make his mind up if this part of Zoira was inhabited or not.

He hoped to God it wasn’t.

”Guys, the laser cannon is gearing up for another hit— _Lance_ , watch out!”

Pidge’s voice was a mere background noise compared to the distinct rumble of the Galra weapon that was angled right by the orbit in which Blue had found herself flying around the ship. Lance parried upwards, hoped the cannon would follow him up and away from the city, which it did, and, uh, maybe that wasn’t exactly the greatest plan that Lance had ever had but it _did_ keep another part of Zoira intact down on the ground, so… worth it.

”It’s descending!” Allura warned them, and Lance immediately turned to fly down with the rest of the team to hunt the ship that evidently didn’t find chasing the Blue lion beneficial. A shudder went through his entire body when he realized where exactly the Galra ship was headed.

”Hey—hey, _guys_ — _Keith_ is down there! He’s still down there—we have to get it away, we can’t—” he shouted, a panic he couldn’t really quell down entering his tone. He felt it spreading through all the lions like some kind of infection.

”Hunk, go full offense—Pidge, you and I have to slow it down, buy us a few moments for Red to come and pick Keith up so we can form Voltron and end this,” Shiro shouted, orders coming out even faster than training drills, but Lance barely managed to comprehend a single word. He was too busy urging Blue to go faster, to catch up before the laser cannon reloaded and fried the whole neighborhood below.

”C’mon, girl, you can go faster than this,” he mumbled, felt the strain in Blue that they both refused to give in to. He was finally flying parallel to the Galra ship, only a few paces behind the actual cannon, when Hunk knocked into the ship with all of Yellows might.

” _Wooh_! Take that, you big, metal scrap-can!” he shouted, the ship careening away from Lance’s flank and slowing down enough for him to take the lead.

”Lance—go low, use your ice-cannon and—”

He didn’t hear the rest.

Lance was closing in on the ground like a meteor, and down there he saw the flashing red of Keith’s armor, the Red Paladin himself running to get across the open square of pavement by the daycare playground—and there, on the other side of the plaza Lance saw Ada, huddling down by a park bench. Keith was only a tiny dot down there on the ground, but Lance wasn’t nicknamed sharpshooter for nothing, his eyes stayed glued to him like the bullseye on a dart board.

The telling hum of the laser cannon made itself known somewhere behind Lance, an electric current tightening the very air around him, but even that fell far into his subconscious. All he could focus on was getting down there before it was too late. For a moment he felt inseparable from Blue, a sort of mind-meld he hadn’t been able to unlock quite as successfully before, and they went down as if the ground would cave a way for them.

”Lance—” Hunk shouted his name, a distant rumble over the comm ”—gotta move, you won’t make it! It’s going to hit you—” Lance ignored him. Ignored Pidge’s alarmed shouting as well. Ignored Allura telling him to abort whatever he was doing. Ignored the fact that Shiro wasn’t saying anything at all.

Shiro, if anyone, would understand why Lance was steering Blue right in the way of the laser-beam.

Far down there, yet not as far as it had been only a second ago, Lance watched as Keith finally caught up to Ada, clutched her into his chest and kept running away towards the buildings on the other side of the road, seeking shelter inside.

Something in Lance relaxed, at least they were somewhat safe in there, at least they wouldn’t—

Lance saw the sheen from the illuminating light of the laser-beam even before he heard the mind-numbing crackling of the actual cannon, and closed his eyes on pure instinct from the bright light.

_I’m sorry, Blue_ , he managed thinking through the horror of it all.

And then—

” _Lance!_ ”

He got hit. Something clanked into him, causing Blue to spiral in the air, and through her windshield he saw a familiar shape, big and red and thought _Keith?_ and then everything went white. An excruciating pain rippled through Blue and then into Lance himself, his bones quaking in his body as if electrocuted.

He didn’t recall falling through the air and crashing right into the fountain in the middle of the plaza.

Lance flickered his eyes open, and then flickered them open a few times more before he managed to keep them open for more than a few seconds. ”Ah, shit,” he groaned, the world coming onto him all at once, ” _fuck_.” He pushed himself up on his elbows, all his joints sizzling as if he’d been fried from the inside out—and then he realized he was actually splayed out on the cockpit ceiling. ” _Blue?_ ” he hissed, voice breaking halfway through it. Blue didn’t make herself known at all, her absence a gaping hole in his head. ”Fuck,” he said again, pulling himself up on the feet in a rather swaying motion—actually, scratch that, the entire floor was swaying beneath him.

Lance staggered his way to the exit and climbed out through Blue’s slightly ajar mouth and fell limply down on the concrete bottom of the fountain outside. Everything was spinning as he lied there on his back, eyes closing on their own, water soaking through his armor. He tensed his legs, his arms, tried wiggling his back to see if anything felt off, but nothing seemed broken at least. There had been no blood or wounds that could be seen through his armor or the suit, so Lance thought he’d been pretty lucky. The only thing he really noticed was the over-bearing dizziness, and that weird jittery tickling of his joints. He felt like he’d been powered up to max by a lithium ion battery and downed, like, 15 energy drinks in less than a minute. A concussion, maybe?

Lance opened his eyes, and could have almost thought he'd fainted if only for the fact that the sky was completely black. Dark, compact clouds spread out above him like a thick quilt, blocking the ever shining red sun of Aegis from peaking through. Ashes floated in the air, falling down on Lance’s face like snowflakes. There was a high-pitched noise that shrilled in his ears. For a second, after Lance had confirmed that he was indeed very conscious and not on the brink of death, he was afraid that maybe he’d been knocked out for several _hours_ , until he remembered the laser cannon, and realized that it wasn’t the night sky, or even clouds at all—it was smoke.

_C’mon_ , Lance urged himself and got his body out of the water. He shivered as the air hit his plastered suit, and then he looked up.

”Oh, no— _Blue._ ”

Blue was almost unrecognizable. Her entire left side completely ruined, armor melted down to a messy pulp by the laser-beam, her blue exterior as blackened by smoke as the sky. Lance couldn’t do anything but gape at her, his worry only growing as he couldn’t feel even the smallest of inkling of her in his head.

Lance’s eyes flickered to the left of Blue then, his brain lighting up at a sudden reminder.

Far across the other side of the fountain he saw the familiar shape of Red lying in his own crater in the ground, equally banged up as Blue, if not even more scorched from the laser-beam. Suddenly very aware of his own heartbeat, Lance managed taking quite a few staggering steps in Red’s direction—and then he remembered that Keith hadn’t actually made it into Red. He came to a halt and whipped his head back around to the other side and—

The ground swallowed his feet.

Across the plaza, on the other side of the road, the whole street of buildings had collapsed in on themselves, only ruins standing, evidence that neither Blue or Red had managed to catch the whole force of the hit from the laser-beam.

”No,” Lance gasped, a trembling step towards the buildings swinging him into full action despite the pain rippling through his body, ”no— _no_ , fuck— _Keith!_ ” he screamed at the top of his lungs as he sprinted over the pavement, adrenaline pumping through his veins, jumping over big chunks of red brick houses, skidding across the gravel and coughing up dust that dimmed the air. ” _Ada_ —” he managed between coughing-fits, climbing over one last fallen wall and sliding down on the other side and finding himself somewhat by the entrance where he saw Keith run for shelter.

” _Keith!_ ” he shouted, and made his way inside the building. His voice echoed back at him in the cave-like cavity of the building. It was too dark to make out where Lance was putting his feet, but he plowed his way inside anyway, squeezing himself between two blocks of concrete walls. ”Fuck _me_ , honestly—are you goddamn _kidding_ —”

” _Lance?_ ” came an answering echo through the ruins, somewhere in front of him. Lance’s breath hitched in his throat.

”Ada!” he shouted back, eventually, slightly doubting himself if he’d really heard her voice for real or if it was just wish thinking. He pulled himself through the gap and fell down right on his face on the ground as he dropped through the floor on the other side. ” _Ugh—_ ” he grunted and dusted away as much of the gravel from his eyes as he could with his equally dirty hands, pushing up from the ground and scuffling ahead through the tight space. ”Ada, can you hear me!”

”Lance—” came her sobbing voice, much, _much_ closer than before, and Lance could feel his pulse in every single vein in his body. ” _Help_ —he’s not—he’s not _moving_ —”

”Ada, honey—can you see anything? Where are you?” Lance soothed, trying not to think too much about what she just had said. It really was too dark to see anything, but there weren’t that many ways to go either and her voice was definitely coming from somewhere in front of him and—

”Under the wall— _here!” s_ he shouted suddenly, her voice coming from somewhere directly under Lance’s feet, as if he’d stepped on them. ”I see your shoes— _help_ me—”

Lance dropped to his knees, and _there_ , in the tightest of gaps between a crumbling wall and the floor, a tiny hand peeked through. Lance could’ve started singing of pure joy when he bent down and saw Ada’s face in the dark—until his hands touched the ground and got soaked in a hot, thick liquid.

”Ada,” Lance gulped, the iron tinted scent corroding his nostrils, ”are you—are you hurt? Can you move?”

”I’m fine—” she sobbed, dragging in a rattling breath which didn’t exactly calm Lance’s nerves down, ”m-my arm hurts.”

Lance nodded, tried to figure out what to do—how to get them out of there—

”Keith,” he said then, despite it all, ”is he—is he there with you—”

Ada started crying again, big, gasping sobs, until ” _Lance_ ,” she whined. And then, suddenly, as if a spotlight shined through the little cavity where she lied, Lance suddenly noticed another hand laying limp next to Ada’s face.

And… you know how it goes in those nightmares where you don’t have the control of your body, where every movement is in slow-motion and too fast all at once, where it feels like you’re trapped inside a flesh prison, and someone else is moving your limbs, your face, your eyes—that’s what it felt like as Lance’s gaze drifted up that familiar armor connected to the hand, and then greasy, black hair entered his line of sight, until, completely against Lance’s will, Keith’s pale face revealed itself resting a bit over Ada’s head.

You know, the kind of nightmare that is the hardest to wake up from.

Keith’s entire upper body was spread on top of Ada and protecting her from the wall that was crushing the both of them. Blood oozed all over the floor beneath them, coating Lance’s hands and knees where he crouched down.

And the worst part: Keith’s eyes were closed, and they remained closed, even as Lance said his name, once, twice; even as he cried it out, desperately.

Lance gasped, closed his eyes for a second, and pulled himself together.

”Okay—Ada, listen,” he said, catching her gaze and holding it, ”I’m going to get you out of here, alright? It’s gonna hurt, I know, but we need to get you to a hospital so the doctors can look at your arm, okay? You with me?”

Ada nodded slightly from where she lied, so incredibly brave.

”Okay—” Lance closed his eyes again, ”here’s what we’re gonna do: I’m going in there and I’m going to push up the wall so you can crawl out—okay? And then you’re going to get us some help so we can get Keith here out as well—”

”But—but I—” Ada cried, hiccuping and interrupting herself. Lance smiled at her and reached out his hand to grab hers.

”You can do it, Ada, I know you can—hey, listen, think of it as a game, like the one you played with me that day we met—you remember, right? You were all dirty, like you are now, and you rolled out in front of me and—”

”And I wanted you to see if I was alive,” she finished for him, as Lance’s own voice was starting to give up on him. Lance nodded, and smiled even bigger to make up for his horrible, terrified voice.

” _Yes_! Exactly! D’you think you can do that to someone else out there when you get out? And make them come in here and check Keith as well?”

Ada hiccuped, and then she got this determined look on her face, and nodded.

”Good,” Lance said, as soothingly as he could. ”Okay, I’m coming in there, just—just lay still, okay? I’ll tell you when you can move.”

It was a lot easier said than done, as everything usually is.

Lance got down on the floor, ignoring the blood smearing all over his armor, ignoring the immediate claustrophobia that hit him as soon as he really saw how tiny the space was under the wall, and shimmied his way in anyway. Immediately Ada started shrieking in pain, the movement jolting her hurt arm that was placed somewhere under Keith. Lance tried to be careful, tried hushing and soothing her, but there really wasn’t much he could do until he was finally placed in a somewhat okay position. One arm squeezed around Keith’s back and placed on the ground on the other side of them, and his other still firmly on the ground just outside the wall.

”Okay—” he grunted, looking down at Ada who was tightly huddled now next to Keith beneath Lance’s chest. ”Ready?”

She sniffled, but nodded again.

”Okay, on three—one, two… _three_ ,” and Lance pushed against the floor, almost slipping on the blood but managing to remain upright, and the wall started rising—only a few inches, mind you, but a few inches enough for Ada to wiggle her way out.

She cried out the whole way, her arm bent awkwardly as she finally got it loose from under Keith, and then the tiny space beneath the wall got just that much bigger as she finally rolled out onto the floor outside.

” _Ada_ ,” Lance hissed through his gritted teeth, the wall pressing into his back as if it personally wanted him flat on the ground.

”I’m _ok_ -ay,” she sobbed. ”I’m—I’m going,” she continued then, the strong girl, and got up from the floor. ”I’ll be right back—” and then all Lance could hear was the echo of her tiny feet clattering across the building.

He closed his eyes, absolutely _refused_ to look at the boy beneath him.

Instead, his mind redirected itself into thinking about kissing Keith—not _now_ , of course, Jesus—but about how it had been like kissing him earlier, when the day was still amendable. When kissing him had felt like a lucky-charm, a kind of promise, like, _hey, this sucks, but at least we have something to talk about later, after it’s over?_ It felt like ages ago, already. As if Lance had lived through another lifetime, and suddenly here he was, with the boy he loved probably bleeding out under him—

No, _fuck_ —scratch that.

Kissing Keith.

Kissing Keith felt like waking up to the sunlight through the curtains in his room back in Varadero. Kissing Keith felt like screaming at the top of his lungs as he soared through Arus in Blue when they all first started training as a team. Kissing Keith felt like every adventure Lance had ever dreamed of, and every onslaught of homesickness, all at the same time.

And Lance found it impossible to keep his eyes closed when Keith was right there beneath him.

His arms were trembling. The wall growing heavier by the second, slowly but surely pushing Lance further down, and by the time Lance dared opening his eyes he was already as good as laying flat on top of Keith.

” _Keith,_ ” he whispered.

How long had they even been there? It felt like hours.

”Keith, do you—can you hear me?” Lance said, a bit louder, his lips resting right by Keith’s temple. He got some of his hair in his mouth, tasted the salty sweat and breathed in the inevitable heavy scent of blood. ”I think Ada’s gonna make it,” he continued, a slight huff shuddering through his body. ”She’s a brave girl, she’ll find help in no time.”

Lance’s legs started tingling, as if they were about to go numb.

Keith didn’t answer.

”I think you’re gonna make it, too,” Lance continued, despite the silence. ”Though, it’s pretty sad that you’re going to miss out on this bonding moment—oh, man, you’re going to be so pissed at me… I probably shouldn’t tell you. I mean, I do enjoy having my limbs attached to my body and all… if I was smart I probably wouldn’t say anything—”

Something crackled ominously above them. Lance froze and listened, not that there was anything he could’ve done anyway if the sound was anything to worry about. His and Keith’s lives depended on the sturdiness of a building in collapse, and the stubbornness of a seven year old with a broken arm.

The wet dripping of water echoed through the stone walls, and Lance counted each drop like the ticking of a clock. After a few hundred of them, Lance felt something in his chest tensing, a tightrope between skyscrapers, as if another high-stakes decision was taking form somewhere inside of him.

”Keith,” he whispered again, one of the best words to whisper, if you asked Lance. ”Hey, you’re going to be so fucking mad at me if you’re actually listening right now,” Lance chuckled, as much as he could with a concrete wall pushing onto his back and a jetpack right under this chest, ”but I… I actually do remember the bonding moment. I lied to you. I just—I was just being a coward, okay? I was being a coward because I didn’t want you to know that I—that I actually—” Lance pressed his forehead into Keith’s hair. Breathed in. Pretended they were lounging in one of the couch alcoves in the castle. That Keith was simply sleeping. That any secret told right here, right now, wouldn’t be told for the last time. ”I was afraid,” he whispered, ”and I didn’t want you to know that I lo—”

” _Lance!_ ”

Lance froze with his lips brushing against Keith’s cheek, and fell completely silent, the only noise being his name bouncing between the walls, growing in volume as if the voice came closer, floating in and out of his ears like some kind of fever dream, until—

” _Lance, can you hear me!_ ”

Lance gasped, feeling suddenly as if he’d been woken up from a dream, and then he started sobbing, finally allowing himself the comfort of hoping someone else would come and rescue them.

”Here!” he shouted back, voice cracking, ” _fuck_ —we’re here! Under the wall—”

From there on his mind started turning a bit foggy.

A few memories stood out, though, like flickering, black and white pictures. Lance remembered Hunk, and his face showing up next to him down on the ground. He remembered him and a couple other aegians lifting the wall and pulling them out of there. He remembered that they had to bend his fingers off of Keith’s armor—his hands coming off blood stained—so they could strap him to some kind of stretcher.

And then the memories stopped coming. For a while.

The very next thing he remembered was waking up in the med-bay with the worst head-ache in the entire history of head related injuries. He groaned at the brightness of the world outside the comfort of his eyelids, even though the lights were all turned down to the lowest of dims, a clear sign of it being sometime in the middle of the night at the Castle.

”Lance?” a voice whispered, as loud as shouting once it reached Lance’s mind. ”Buddy? You really awake this time?”

Lance turned his head, eyes narrowed and distrusting of his own ability to keep them open, and made up Hunk sitting in a chair next to his hospital bed.

”Yeah,” Lance said, voice as soft as Hunk’s had been, a barely noticeable hum, and still it had him cringing as the vibrations bounced in his scull. ”Super awake,” he mumbled anyway. He shuffled himself up into a sitting position despite his aching head and body, only to freeze, looking down at himself. The lack of armor registered only as an afterthought.

”You’ve been sleeping for a few hours,” Hunk whispered, noticing his sudden disorientation. ”Allura thinks that laser cannon was more of a raw quintessence fueled cannon. You got hit pretty bad. It fucked up your aura or something, so your body kind of shut down to protect itself. She figured the best we could do was just to let you sleep it off… It’s almost morning.”

Lance glanced up at him, a rather simple movement, but it felt like miles between him and Hunk.

”No cryopod?”

Hunk looked troubled.

”Not for you, no,” he said.

”Keith,” Lance prompted. Hunk leaned back in his chair, fingers clenching at his knees.

”I don’t know when he’ll get out, but he’s okay,” he sighed, eyes straying to the side, away from Lance. He tilted his head to the side as well, following the direction of Hunk’s gaze towards the cryopods, all of them in full use healing aegians hurt from the galra attack and then landing directly onto the pod that housed the red paladin. Keith was rather fuzzy through the pain of Lance’s headache and the thick glass of the pods that separated them across the room. A final, heavy sigh rattled its way through Lance’s throat anyway, his muscles relaxing at the sight of Keith, whole and breathing, healing inside a pod.

_He’s okay,_ Lance reassured himself, _he’s gonna be okay._

”Good,” Lance murmured, almost content enough to let sleep take over him once again.

”You scared us,” Hunk said, tearing through whatever lulling fog Lance had stumbled upon. He flickered his eyes open, unaware of having them shut in the first place. Hunk sighed again, longer this time, as if he’d been keeping those three words inside of him the whole night. ”Ada—the Aegian girl—she found us and told me you and Keith were dying in that building, and then she dropped to the ground to demonstrate? I think?” Lance chuckled lightly, couldn’t help it. Hunk frowned. ”She was very stubborn that I checked her pulse.”

”Is she okay?”

”Yeah, she went with some aegian paramedics—you should have seen her, man, she was fighting them the whole way, saying she wanted to follow us back to make sure we checked _your_ pulse.”

”She does that,” Lance hummed and could only imagine the furious resistance of Ada as they dragged her away. He chuckled again, and almost didn’t notice what Hunk mumbled.

”I thought you were dead,” he’d said.

Lance’s chuckle faded, and then he looked at Hunk, finally. Really _looked_ at him. His fringe fell in tangled, greasy strands down his forehead. His headband more dirty brown than orange, as were his armor that he still hadn’t changed out of. All evidence of him having been sitting there next to Lance’s hospital bed this whole time, waiting for him to wake up.

”I’m sorry,” was all that Lance could offer. Hunk’s frown deepened.

”Nothing to be sorry for. You saved Keith’s life.”

For some reason, it didn’t sound like reassurance. It sounded like a badly concealedaccusation, very uncharacteristic of Hunk. Lance mirrored his expression.

”What are you saying,” he questioned. Hunk looked away.

”I’m not saying anything.”

”You clearly have something you want to say—just spit it out already,” Lance snapped, also very uncharacteristically, at least when it came to him speaking to Hunk. Hunk still refused to look at him. ”What? You think I should’ve just left Keith and Ada there? To die?” Lance knew his words cut a bit deeper than he’d really intended by the shocked look that Hunk finally laid upon him.

”Of course not,” Hunk said, properly affronted. ”That’s not what this is about—”

”Then what exactly are we—”

”You _know_ exactly what we’re talking about!”

Lance stared, eyes wide open, mouth still forming the other half of his sentence. Hunk had leaned forwards in his seat again, almost towering over Lance’s hospital bed, but he didn’t look angry, no. He looked devastated. Pleading, almost. The seconds ticked, and Hunk settled back, slowly, in his chair. ”You know exactly what this is about,” he said again, whispering this time.

Lance didn’t. At least, he thought he didn’t.

”I don’t—”

”You’re in love with Keith,” Hunk said, suddenly, totally unprompted, as if that explained any of this.

”What,” Lance said. Hunk looked pained, his soft features twisting into something unwelcome on his best friend’s face, and Lance understood that this was a topic that Hunk probably hadn’t meant to bring up—at least, not right now. Which in turn implied that he’d been planning to bring it up at _some_ point. ” _What_ ,” Lance said again, because if there was any time to have this conversation, now was just as good.

”You’re in love with Keith, buddy, I know,” Hunk repeated, wiping his palms across his thighs, and Lance blanched at the complete confidence in those words. Like it was just a simple fact of life. Lance is in love Keith—how could he not be? Nausea rose in him along with the realization of what that would mean. How obvious had Lance been? Did anyone else know? Did _Keith_? Did he know, and just hadn’t said anything? Did he know, and hadn’t said anything because he didn’t know what to say? Fuck, had he even _wanted_ to kiss— ”Lance,” Hunk said, snapping his attention back to his next sentence, ”I’m not saying what you did was wrong, or that you should’ve left them under that wall, or even that you shouldn’t have broken formation and flied Blue ahead of the cannon—all I’m saying is that—” Hunk interrupted himself, as if teetering right by the edge of a building, eyes landing on Lance as if he was the pavement on the bottom of a great height.

”What,” Lance said, for a third time. ”What are you saying.”

Hunk cleared his throat.

”Would you have done all that for anyone else.”

It wasn’t a question.

Lance felt his pulse as if his heart was placed somewhere high up in his throat.

”Of course I—”

”I don’t think you would,” Hunk interrupted. ”I mean, of course you’d want to save Ada. Of course you would have come for me—but not for just anyone, Lance, and not even at that length, not even for _me_. There’s something about Keith that completely detaches you from reality, that keeps you from thinking critically—”

”Stop talking—”

”—something about him that just makes you zone out of anything else going on around you. I’m not saying going after Keith was bad—I’m _not,_ but—”

”Hunk—”

” _Lance._ You put yourself in between him and a _laser-cannon_ without a second of considering what would happen to you after, you didn’t listen to us at all—Red was already on the way to Keith, we could’ve shut the cannon down even before the beam went off, we could’ve stopped it _together_ —”

” _Hunk_.”

Hunk gaped at him, scrambling for words that wouldn’t come out. Lance didn’t feel particularly up to having this conversation anymore.

”—there you are!”

Coran’s cheerful tone echoed through the med-bay. Lance’s eyes drifted over Hunk’s shoulder, towards the team trailing in through the doors one after one behind him. He pretended that he didn’t notice Hunk’s gaze still fixated on him in the corner of his eyes.

”Here I am,” Lance responded, perhaps not equally as cheerful, but hey, he’d just woken up from a quintessence overdose. Pidge came running across the floor only to crash into Lance’s bed, throwing her arms over his middle and hugging him tight. ”Hello to you too,” he mumbled, settling his own arms around her.

”You’re an idiot, I was worried,” she grumbled into his shirt. Lance could only laugh. Shiro put his hand on his shoulder, Allura smiled brightly next to Coran who looked like he was about to cry of joy, or maybe already had.

”Well, number four is ready to come out about any second now,” Coran said eventually after a few heartwarming segments of ’ _how are you_ ’s and ’ _what were you thinking_ ’s.

Lance’s full attention went directly to the pod, his body rising from the bed of its own accord, walking towards Keith as if pulled by a string. The team walked with him, Hunk a secure rock right by his side as they stopped in front of the pod. Keith was still dressed up in his under suit, the armor was gone, and Lance felt almost grateful for the dark material so he wouldn’t have to face the abundance of red drenching his whole body.

Pidge shuffled ahead to peer into the pod.

”So, are we just going to stand here until he comes out or what—”

The pod door swooshed open and Keith dropped forwards immediately after, almost bringing both him and Pidge’s shrieking self to the floor hadn’t Lance and Shiro been so fully ready to catch him. Lance felt Keith’s sharp shoulder knock into his chest as if catching a marble statue, a choked huff exiting his mouth at the collision.

”What—” Keith said, his raspy voice barely managing to hold onto the word.

”Hey,” Lance murmured into Keith’s bangs. ”You’re okay, you’re alright,” he reassured as Keith’s whole body un-tensed.

”Stop hogging him—” Pidge declared and jammed herself back in between their chests, bringing her arms around Keith much the same way she did with Lance. Keith hugged her back as if on autopilot, his hair a ruffled mess, eyes puffy and unfocused. He looked as if they’d just woken him up from a really good nap.

Lance backed away a few steps, graciously letting the others have their moment with Keith, but not for too long. The invisible string connecting him to Keith wouldn’t allow him to stray too far away.

”How about a nice, long shower, hm?” Shiro prompted Keith, his hands grasping onto Keith’s shoulders. His knuckles turned white at the firm grip. It didn’t look as if Shiro was as ready to let go of him as his words may have insinuated. Keith nodded, his eyes still betraying the far away state of his mind, until they found themselves landing on Lance.

”Ada?” Keith said, a simple name holding so much punch.

Lance nodded. ”She’s okay.” A simple explanation for a simple question. And Keith, a simple man, nodded back.

”Okay,” he said, ”good.”

And then Shiro offered his guidance to the showers, which Keith absentmindedly accepted. Lance watched as they left the room, Allura and Coran following after making sure the pod was set back into its normal state. Pidge managed quite a few steps as well until she noticed Hunk and Lance’s absence next to her.

”Guys?” she said, eyebrows furrowed in an exasperated manner.

Lance opened his mouth. Nothing came out. Hunk simply shrugged sheepishly towards Pidge and pulled Lance by the arm through the doorway, bantering with Pidge about Lance’s weird state of mind all the way through the corridors, into his room until he was, suddenly, placed on his bed. Hunk and Pidge stared at him as he sat there, worried glances thrown between each other occasionally.

”Seriously, what’s wrong with him?” Pidge said, as if Lance had lost his hearing.

”I don’t even know where to begin,” Hunk hummed.

” _Hey_ ,” Lance said then, because he could only take so much trash talking before he snapped. ”Can’t a guy wallow in his own despair just for a second?”

Pidge bent forwards, pushing her glasses up her nose as if Lance was another one of her cryptic computer problems to dissect.

”You’re alive—cheer up,” she offered as a solution, finally. Lance sighed as to get rid of the excess raging heat building up inside of him. Hunk put his arm around Pidge’s shoulders and brought her against him—to protect her from Lance’s evident fury? Most likely.

”What she _means_ ,” he said, ”is that you’re alive, and you haven’t showered since, like, three days ago, so you should really get on with that. And maybe go to bed—”

”I’m not tired,” Lance said then. Which was actually true. The electric humming of his joints hadn’t disappeared, and he didn’t think he’d ever slept better than these past hours after the quintessence basically overloaded his body.

”Still, it’s like four in the morning. Try sleeping just a few more hours.”

Lance sighed again, in resignation this time. This seemed to please Hunk, a shared look with Pidge signaling their departure.

”See you tomorrow, buddy,” Hunk said, a quick yet significant clap to his shoulder before they backed away towards the door. Pidge waved as well. Lance simply glared at them, and then the door closed behind them, leaving him all by himself in the silence.

Lance, not necessarily wanting to fall back into his wallowing, got up from the bed and followed Hunk’s advice to take a shower. Getting all the dirt and grime off of his body made him feel a lot better, at least physically. Mentally? That was a whole other kind of damage to mend. His mind kept flickering back to the memory of Keith laying limp beneath him, and each time that image in particular entered his head, he felt as if the walls crept just an inch closer. Lance remembered his immense gratitude for Keith’s armor possibly being his only saving grace, conflicted with the frustration of how it made it impossible for him to know if Keith was even breathing—and how could he even begin consider the possibility that he _wasn’t—_ because Keith had his eyes were shut closed, face angled to the ground, Lance couldn’t reach close enough to feel any sign of exhale; he remembered the weight of the wall forcing Lance down on top of him, the inevitable fear that he was only causing Keith more pain, more hurt, more injuries; the blood oozing out from beneath them, the scent of it all gnawing at his lungs, his incessant chatter to keep his mind occupied, away from the fact that Keith wasn’t responding, away from the trembling of his own limbs, the sharp gravel of the floor buried into his knees, from the strain to keep Keith from getting _crushed_ —

A knock on his door interrupted his spiraling thoughts. Lance froze with his t-shirt halfway pushed down his chest, sweatpants already on, unaware of even finishing his shower and starting to dress himself. The knocking came back, harder, more persistent this time. Lance pushed down his shirt and went for the door.

”I’m going to sleep, Hunk, there’s no need to—”

”No, you’re not,” Keith said, his sharp features arranged into something piercingly antagonistic in the doorway. Lance gaped at him, red eyed and suddenly so, so tired.

”Uh,” he said, but Keith simply brushed past his shoulder and settled in a spot right in the middle of his room, clearly not intending to leave any time soon. The door closed in a mechanical swoosh behind Lance and suddenly they were all alone. They stared each other down, the silence a heavy blanket falling on top of them. Lance waited for some kind of explanation as to why Keith would show up at his door, at four thirty in the morning, which he apparently was not going to get if Keith’s furious frown was anything to go by. So, ”uh,” he said again and then ”are you okay—”

”You’re a real piece of work.”

” _Hey_ ,” Lance said, feeling awfully attacked lately for someone who’d just got out of a semi-coma. Keith didn’t let Lance’s objection stop him from plowing on.

”You were supposed to stay in Blue—”

”Hey,” Lance said again, his feet moving further into the room, closer to Keith.

”You were supposed to just keep the Galra from landing, and help the others until I could get to Red, not fucking race your way back and—”

”Keith,” Lance said, a soft sound compared to Keith’s growl. His arms reached out for Keith’s shoulders, hands settling securely on top of him, and… and— _oh_.

”—and what? What were you even thinking? That you could stop a fucking _laser_ - _cannon_ from going off by standing in its _way_ —”

Lance’s hands found themselves cradling Keith’s face, and then Lance kissed him.

He really shouldn’t have. He knows he really, really shouldn’t have. Keith was upset, clearly, upset _specifically_ at Lance. Which was usually a pretty universal indication of do-not-kiss-me. But then Lance hands was on him, and there was something about feeling Keith’s strong shoulders beneath his palms, something about that evident, steady rise of his breathing, and for a moment pure euphoria rushed through his veins, a victory ready to be celebrated. Keith was breathing, seething really, angry but very much _alive_ —and Lance’s brain couldn’t find a more fitting reaction than kissing him right on the mouth, even mid argument.

And then of course the cognitive dissonance kicked in, so Lance wrenched his face away from Keith’s lips, staring at him in horror.

Keith however, no matter how angry before, didn’t seem to mind it. He had his eyes closed, whiplashing Lance with his suddenly serene expression. Lance didn’t dare to say anything, afraid to break this odd moment of calm before the storm, so they just stood there. Lance cradling Keith’s cheeks like he was holding a bomb in his palm, Keith’s own hands still and relaxed at his sides. He looked good, Lance thought. Well, he always looked good, but now he looked healthy. Radiant even. His long hair was combed back slightly after a presumed shower, exposing his forehead in a way that Lance rarely got to see. He looked like a normal teenager. Which was, in fact, a devastating thought to have right after surviving intergalactic warfare on an alien planet.

”You were really good with the kids today,” Keith whispered then, out of nowhere, eyes still closed. Lance wouldn’t say he yelped—or, well, maybe a little, but he wasn’t at all prepared for the sudden shift in atmosphere.

”That’s—” he said, furrowing his eyebrows, changing his mind. ”I mean, I guess?”

”And you kissed me.”

Lance definitely yelped this time, let his hands retreat from Keith’s face. And he blushed, a lot.

”I guess I did,” he chuckled, sheepishly, took a step back and scratched the back of his neck just to do _something._

”So…”

”So,” Lance repeated, in lack of any other proper reaction. Keith looked at him now, his expectant gaze prodding him the exact same way his old math teacher used to, as if the answer was that simple and Lance would barely need to guess to get it right. ”So,” Lance repeated once more, tongue coming out of his mouth to lick his dry lips, and then simply went for it, ”I… should kiss you again?”

Keith didn’t beam at him—Keith simply doesn’t _beam_ —but he did do something with his eyes, a slight second of forewarning, and then he attacked him. With his _mouth_. Lance stumbled backwards at the sudden weight of Keith against him, and then he kissed him back.

And, man, kissing Keith just like this was exactly the kind of victory he had in mind.

Lance let his hands travel up Keith’s neck until he cradled his cheeks again, his thumbs caressing the very tip of his cheekbones, feeling up the dip of his jaw and kneading his fingers into Keith’s hair. He angled his head, almost unconsciously, allowing himself to sink into Keith. With Keith’s arms thrown around his back, Lance found himself in the perfect position to not care about his balance and simply indulging in touching Keith in all the places he’s only dreamt of touching.

In that moment, kissing Keith was ocean water splashing on his face, and the strong scent of his abuela’s coffee drifting through the house, and finally being allowed in the pilot seat in his dad’s airplane, and adrenaline rushing through him in a whirlwind as he crashed through the cave wall with Blue that very first day flying her.

Kissing Keith was a lot. But not as much as having Keith pulling free from their kiss only to remove his shirt, letting it drop to the floor between their feet.

That was a lot.

Lance gawked at the shirt, and then back up at Keith again. At the sudden display of pale skin in front of him. At the seemingly easy decision to let Lance see him, stripping off yet another layer of armor. Keith breathed, heavily, his eyes locked onto Lance’s as if daring him to even comment about the binder that stretched across his chest. Lance gulped, and simply nodded in agreement to whatever Keith was offering, a sudden comprehension that Lance was given entrance to something he hadn’t ever imagined being invited into. Keith still looked angry, but Lance started thinking it had less to do with him flying Blue into the beeline of a laser-cannon and more about the fact that he was just standing there staring at him. So, obviously, Lance could only rush forwards, pulling Keith into him and backing up across the floor—amping up the frantic and desperate tension in the room—and then, suddenly, he had Keith sprawled on top of him as the back of his knees knocked into his bed, both falling onto his mattress. Lance barely managed to grunt in surprise before Keith was back at it, allowing this new position to bring them even closer.

”Keith,” Lance breathed, as Keith kissed his way down his throat, except it was more just him dragging his lips across Lance’s skin, his mind more focused on unbuttoning Lance’s jeans. Lance clenched his eyes shut. ”Hey, Keith—”

”What?” Keith said, looking up at him sharply, eyes red-rimmed, bottom lip trembling—and Lance realized suddenly that this frenzied desperation wasn’t what he wanted at all, and then he wondered if Keith had realized the same by the sudden dejection in his eyes. Like flicking a switch, Keith’s tensed shoulders relaxed as he fell limply onto Lance and simply molded himself on top of him, his face buried in the crook of his neck. Lance brought his arms around him, a kind of embrace they both had been craving from the very beginning.

”Shiro told me what you d-did,” Keith accused, pressing his face further into the dark cave of Lance’s neck, something wet against his skin that Keith was trying to hide.

Lance hushed him softly, ignoring the hitched breath inching up his throat, tightened his arms around Keith’s back and let him sink into his chest. It was as if Lance was cement and Keith desperately wanted to drown before it dried, and a bit like having his torso impaled on Keith’s sharp elbows, their bodies rearranging themselves into one; and Lance held on for dear life, because somewhere in all that aching, he thought he glimpsed relief. Lance knew now what it was like to endure—knew what it was like to hold on when he’s not sure if there was anything to hold on to anymore—but this, the cracking edges of Keith, was something entirely different. In every other crevice Lance started finding petals instead of gravel, instead of survival there was discovery, and in the end he wasn’t so sure who was sinking into who anymore.

”Stupid,” Keith ended up saying, and it felt like a kiss to Lance.

”I know,” Lance said.

Keith pushed up on his elbows and looked down on him, his expression as much a weapon as anything else he kept forcing between them, but beneath all that roughness of Keith was something delicate, and Lance was determined to reach it.

”You don’t know anything,” Keith mumbled, eyes traveling all over Lance’s face in a complicated journey, only to land back on his eyes again.

_I know one thing_ , Lance thought, a part of his brain lighting up in sudden clearness.

”I know you don’t want to think at all right now,” Lance whispered, allowing a hand to push Keith’s hair back from his face, settling on the back of his head. Keith unraveled at that, as if Lance had cracked some kind of code, and dropped back down, covering his body in the shape of Lance's body, top to toe, like camouflage, as if to protect himself—except Lance was not a threat to Keith. Not anymore. Never had been even to begin with.

Keith’s lips fit right against his. Lance circled his arm around him, used the other as leverage to twist around and pull Keith down to the mattress. Lance pushed himself up, looked down at Keith, then further down his body, raising his eyebrows in question. Keith nodded, and Lance immediately went to pull Keith’s pants down his legs, lifting his feet up to flick the ends from his ankles. His hands roamed their way back up over his shins, and then traveling around the knees to the back of Keith’s thighs, letting his legs fall open, allowing Lance to inch closer between them. Lance looked up at Keith, to make sure he hadn’t accidentally trailed off track somewhere along the way, but Keith had closed his eyes, breathing suspiciously even, fists clenching around the blanket beneath them. Lance’s hands continued their way across Keith’s skin then, grazing the soft material of his boxers, feeling the shivers spread beneath his touch as his hands found their way over his stomach. Lance shuddered and trailed the stretchy fabric of Keith’s binder.

“Okay?” he asked, a single breath through his lips, and let his eyes travel up over Keith’s chest until he met his eyes.

“Yeah,” Keith breathed back and clenched his eyes shut again, as if having Lance draped over him like this, his full attention on him like a spotlight, was too much for him to comprehend. Lance’s face bursted out in a smirk, this whole situation unfathomable, his muscles controlled by some amused third party from another room. He brought his head down to hide that smile, kissing Keith right between his ribs.

”Okay,” he confirmed against the soft patch of skin above Keith’s bellybutton. A breath hitched in Keith’s throat, reverberating all through his chest and, suddenly, Lance felt as if he had already wasted too much time not having his mouth all over him. He curled his fingers beneath the edge of the binder and pushed it up and over Keith’s head until he could throw it over the edge of the bed to collect on the floor with the rest of Keith’s clothes.

For a tense second Lance thought Keith was going to cross his arms over his chest, a poor substitute to the removed layer between them, or maybe shift a little—maybe hint to Lance that it was okay to touch him, to devour him like he was dying to do. The ticking castle clock on Lance’s nightstand slowed down, and Lance gathered that this, right here, was a moment that was worth waiting for if needed—but Keith didn’t move. Didn’t really do anything besides letting his body sink into the mattress beneath them, like a rock submitting to the raging force of the ocean. Lance _looked_ , let his eyes roam the entire landscape of skin right there in front of him, mouth going completely dry.

”Can I—”

” _Yes_ ,” Keith replied, before Lance even managed to formulate his request, and the pure vehemence of the consent was enough to get him moving. He shifted until he sat properly on his knees between Keith’s spread legs, Keith’s thighs resting on top of his. Goosebumps appeared in abundance wherever Lance’s lips grazed over Keith’s exposed sternum and where he let his fingers spread over pale ribs, his gentle palms burning as they traveled sideways, pressing into the tight gap between Keith’s back and the mattress until they settled just below his shoulder blades. Lance kissed wherever his lips could reach, pushing Keith up closer against him. Keith’s breathing picked up quickly, his heartbeat drumming right against Lance’s cheek, so he brought his hands back from his hold around him, as to not make him feel as trapped, and moved forwards until his face leveled up with his.

”Hey, it’s okay,” he whispered, bracing himself on his arm next to Keith’s shoulder. His other hand found itself caressing its way into Keith’s hair all on its own. ”No thinking,” he hushed, leaning his forehead down on Keith’s. Keith flickered his eyes open, locked into Lance’s with such ferocity Lance thought he was going to catch on fire.

” _I know,_ ” Keith said, like they were in the middle of an argument, and Lance wanted to laugh. Wanted to kiss him so bad he didn’t know how he had managed to hold it in for so long.

”Okay,” he murmured, smirking so wide he was afraid he wasn’t going to be able to kiss Keith at all anytime soon, and then Keith huffed as he reached up to catch Lance’s lips in another kiss all by himself. Lance brought his whole body down into that kiss, and finally, Keith put his own hands on Lance, clutched at his shoulders and continued down his arms, jumping over to the exposed skin on his waist where his shirt had rode up, grabbing so hard Lance was sure he was going to leave bruises, only to bring him even closer, grinding against Lance.

”Jesus— _okay_ ,” Lance groaned through slotted lips.

”You’re wearing too much _clothes_ ,” Keith growled, arching his back as to point out the obvious barrier Lance’s shirt created between their chests. Lance groaned again and ripped his mouth from Keith’s, straightening back up to sit on his heels and pull his shirt off. He threw it away across the room and looked back down at Keith, at his huge eyes that stubbornly didn’t go any further south than Lance’s collarbones.

”Better?” Lance smirked, pulling a hand through his messed up hair.

Keith glared at him, a firm frown covering his mouth.

”A little,” he muttered, locking his ankles behind Lance’s back. Lance chuckled, leaned down to cage Keith’s head between his forearms again. He touched his nose to Keith’s, grazing the tip of his nose all the way up Keith’s cheekbone and back again, before letting his eyes settle on his.

The moment lingered.

Suddenly, Lance didn’t want to move, didn’t feel the need to—just wanted to keep looking into Keith’s eyes, wanted to keep Keith’s body close and secure beneath him. Keith didn’t seem to mind either, but then his lips parted, the smallest of inhales stealing Lance’s breath away, and the air grew thicker, until it smothered Lance in the unsaid, in the things they really should talk about—but not now. Not tonight, Lance decided, urged. Tonight they can think about something else.

”Psh,” Lance snorted into the tiny gap between them, ”you think I’m handsome.”

It was meant as a joke, to undo some of the tension, but the way Keith was looking at him now—that wary hint of something wet suddenly reappearing in the corners of his eyes, chin wobbling up and down in pressing attempt at holding it all in—made it clear to Lance that it wouldn’t be so easy to escape reality.

”I think you’re insufferable,” Keith whispered, a light hand finding its way to Lance’s cheek, stroking it gently, almost reverently—as if he was afraid that Lance would break if he pressed too hard. The very top of Lance’s throat tied itself into a knot.

”Yeah, insufferably _handsome_.”

Keith surged up again, even as he nodded, and caught Lance’s lips in his; teeth knocking into each other, lips clashing awkwardly—and this time the kiss didn’t break that easily.

Lance barricaded all images of Keith—cold and limp, paler than ever before, lying in his own pool of blood—to the furthest, darkest corner of his mind. Locked into a box that could rattle how much it wanted. Lance was too busy getting the remaining of their clothes off, making sure Keith—living, breathing, _stubborn_ Keith—got a moment to forget, to not think; thanking God for allowing Lance this, for granting another night, another day, where he got to appreciate him being alive.

In the later hours of morning, when too tired to stay awake, when the adrenaline had made its last round through their veins, when Lance finally managed to quell down the urge to keep making sure Keith was actually breathing next to him, it was with the entirety of his body pressed into the dips and hills of Keith’s body. Sharing the same space. The same heat.

_There really are no guaranteed eternities in this life,_ Lance thought right at the brink of sleep, _maybe really living is just grabbing what you want and run with it, before it’s too late._ Lance brought his hand up and lazily caressed some black strands of hair behind Keith’s ear. _Just like this_ , he thought.

_And this._

A kiss to the bare nape of Keith’s neck.

_And this._

Laying his hand on top of Keith’s, their fingers perfectly slotted together, as if the sole purpose of life was to hold on.

_Galaxy Garrison, first year_

__

Lance turned fourteen the summer before he began his first year at the Garrison. It was far from his first birthday celebrated without his dad, but it was the first birthday celebrated without his dad’s usual congratulations message waiting for him on his phone. He felt kind of bad about it, because he’d almost forgotten about the message completely, but— _look_. Lance was a forgetful person, he misplaced things, attached the wrong names to the wrong faces and, occasionally, he forgot that his father sent him texts to tell him happy birthday and wouldn’t text back until the day after when his mama reminded him to check his phone. It was a bad habit, but not very crucial. Until he sat alone in his room the day after his fourteenth birthday, cellphone in hand, a couple of missed notifications but none of them mattering as much as the one that was simply not there.

Not that it really mattered that he forgot his dead dad’s happy birthday message that wouldn’t have come this year no matter if he remembered it or not.

Only a month or so later, he walked into the Garrison as if he owned the place. He’d cut his hair, cleansed and toned all his pimples away—thrown his old bike in the garage back home. He was on his way to become the world’s next greatest pilot so there was no time to waste on playing around on his bike anymore. Most of the cadets knew of the McClain name, and what it meant for the Garrison. The older cadets had probably even been to some of his dad’s lectures. Lance saw it on their faces when he introduced himself, another handshake turning rougher as they seized him up. Of course they did, Lance’s dad was the first man on Mars, and, therefore, Lance must be some kind of prodigy. A natural talent. Flying, something stored somewhere in the code of his DNA. He was the only competition that mattered.

Also his dad was dead. So. There was the extra looming pressure of keeping up the family legacy, which would be enough motivation to not show a single crack in his capability of doing so.

”Listen up, cadets,” Commander Iverson bellowed across the training facility, all the first years lined up in a neat row. ”This is the first assignment that will give you all a chance to put your name up on that chart.” He gestured up towards the screen on the other wall across from them. A clean slate for now, but soon to be filled with all of the names of the very best that Galaxy Garrison had to offer. Lance stood upright, a cocky grin across his lips. His roommate, Hunk, was trembling next to him, not at all ready for their first ride in the training simulators.

”Hey, lighten up,” Lance whispered through the side of his mouth, ”we’ve been studying for weeks.” Hunk nodded, a minuscule gesture as Iverson turned to march back in their direction.

”You’ll team up with your usual crew,” Iverson continued, closing up on them, ”of pilots, engineers and communication cadets—and then show us all what a clean flight is supposed to look like. I want the very best from you today, cadets. Or else there’s no use in staying.” Here, Iverson stopped right in front of Lance. Lance didn’t as much as flinch. He kept his eyes in a relaxed yet focused stare into the simulator ramp a few steps ahead, a couple of inches above Iverson’s shoulder. ”Do not disappoint me,” he said, lower, as if it was meant only for Lance, and then he turned to walk back towards the simulation control booth.

Lance exhaled, only barely, as the first crew went into the simulator—and came out of it just as quickly.

”Commander Iverson, uh, sir,” a tall girl Lance only knew briefly from class said as her crew followed behind her down the ramp, ”there’s been an accident.” One of her crew mates looked particularly green.

Lovely. Just another day of first year cadet puke.

Hunk gagged slightly next to him, and Lance dared sneaking a reassuring pat to his shoulder as Iverson sighed. The simulators got cleaned quickly and then the next crew went in. After every crew, the screen on the wall filled up with names to rank all of the best pilots in their year, and on it went, until the fourth crew was supposed to head in next.

”Cadet Kogane,” Iverson said, and Lance’s gaze snapped, unwillingly, towards the pilot in question. The only pilot without a crew. The only first year cadet that hadn’t been to the party in the empty lecture room on the second floor of the west building to get to know the rest of their peers. The ever elusive and mysterious Keith Kogane—who just happened to be the most infuriating thing to walk these halls, if you asked Lance.

Keith looked up at the sound of his name, and Lance felt something awful and unnecessary flutter in his gut as his dark eyes ghosted past Lance before landing on Iverson.

”Yes, sir,” Keith said, his voice a pitch darker than Lance remembered.

”You’re up next,” Iverson simply said and stepped aside to let Keith walk past him. Keith looked confused—but only for a second, as if he’d accidentally let his mask slip—and then the stoic expression came back as he switched position with the pilot that was supposed to go with crew four. James Whatever—which was all that Lance recalled of his name—muttered something as he walked past Keith down the ramp, causing Keith to flinch, only slightly, barely even noticeable, unless you’d been staring at him as intensely as Lance had been. Lance threw an annoyed glare at James Whatever as he placed himself back in the lineup. It was just general bad mojo to start patronizing the other cadets, the only reason why Lance cared.

Iverson gestured towards the simulator control booth, and then crew four had begun their simulation. The goal was to stay in the air as long as possible and command the crew through various obstacles and technical issues, a standardized test that they would have to retake over and over again throughout their Garrison training. It was all very indulging and above their training grade for now, a simple way of showing that they all had a long way to go, and that some of them were already further along the road.

It was a mission meant to fail. And yet, crew four stayed inside that simulator for several moments longer than the best of the crews before, which dragged into twenty minutes of staring in silence, which eventually urged Iverson into having to interrupt the simulation so the other crews could get a shot at it as well before the lecturing time ran out.

Crew four stepped out of the simulators grinning, except Keith, who looked vaguely bored, like he always did.

”Great work, cadets,” Iverson praised them, which just did not happen, like, ever. The cadets of crew four could only beam in pride as they descended the ramp and walked back to their spots in the line. Keith didn’t indulge in any loud congratulations or eager fistbumps. He simply fell in line, standing at ease as Iverson called out crew five to enter the simulation.

Lance couldn’t help glancing over at him. There was something about Keith that pulled at Lance’s attention as if caught by a hook and wire. Even at the introduction day, when they’d all been the fresh first year newbies, Keith had established himself as something else, something elevated almost. Lance thought he was the most arrogant douchebag he’d ever met. And still— _still_ there was just that something about him that Lance couldn’t put his finger on… and it really didn’t help that he looked the way he did—

” _McClain_.”

Lance yelped at Iverson’s sharp tone, snapping his gaze away from Keith as he too looked up to meet his staring when Iverson called out his name. Iverson gestured impatiently for him to walk up the ramp, which he did, as dignified as he could trailing after the rest of his crew already heading inside the simulator. Hunk gave him a worried look—his unease increased by Lance’s sudden absent-mindedness. Lance could only smile in reassurance and enter the model cockpit with the rest of them.

He’d blame Keith for the slight mishap, except… for some reason, as he set his very first step onto the soft rubber carpet on the inside, a shudder went through his spine. He’d honestly felt a bit off today, like, in general. Even Lance was man enough to admit that that had nothing to do with his issue with Keith. The cockpit felt even smaller than he’d expected, the walls a dull and intruding kind of grey, and nothing like the promise of flying had always felt like to Lance.

”Okay, team,” he said, clearing his throat, and sat himself down in the pilot seat, ignoring the ominous feeling settling itself in the very core of his gut, ”let’s show crew four how it’s done, eh?” He got an echo of affirmative responses, and began the process of starting up the aircraft. He reached with one hand for the control wheel, the other headed for the throttle lever. Both of his hands were trembling.

”We’re ready to go, McClain,” Sara Lundberg confirmed from somewhere behind Lance, far, far behind. As if she’d been talking through an exposed pipeline through the wall. Lance stared at his hands, hovering above the spot where they were supposed to go.

”Lance? Buddy?” Hunk questioned discretely from his seat. Lance clenched his eyes shut and took a deep breath.

”Let’s go,” he said, steeling himself for something he wouldn’t think he’d ever have to worry about. It was only a simulation, but the acceleration forces felt too real. Lance got sucked back into his seat, a disturbing tumble in his gut making itself known.

” _Lance_ ,” a sharp voice snapped at him—which had him opening his eyes, painstakingly realizing that they’d remained closed this whole time—forcing Lance to actually look at the infinite blue in front of him.

Lance has been in a cockpit before, when his dad has flown. He knows what it feels like to watch the sky grow bigger; bigger than anything you’ve ever known, bigger than the ocean from the beach back home. Passing through the clouds and ascending the sky then had felt like getting sucked right into space. Earth, so impossibly small from up there.

Now, Lance felt as if the ground was an imminent danger only biding its time before catching up to him.

The plane lurched to the side.

” _Jesus Christ_ —” Sara shouted. Lance gulped, swallowing down the bile that threatened to go up his throat as he watched the artificial horizon on his instrument panel whirl around ”—get it together, McClain!”

” _Lance_ ,” Hunk said, a detectable worrisome note to his voice, ”we really need to start picking up in altitude—” He tinkered fervently with his own instrument panel, making up for Lances rocky start, but he could only do so much from his end as a huge mountain emerged through the foggy sky in front of them.

”Sure,” Lance choked, his breath coming out in tiny hyperventilations. His hand wouldn’t budge on the throttle lever, the entire weight of the plane suddenly squashing him down. ”Yeah, sure, altitude.”

Hunk said something else, another complaint, but a lid fell over his ears. Lance was cast into relative silence. Cold sweat collected on his forehead, but the mountain didn’t care about his silly issues, it only grew in size by the second, biding its time.

” _McClain!_ ” Sara screamed at him this time, a shell shock to all his senses.

Lance felt his pulse picking up at the evident danger approaching them. His lungs ached for a proper breath of oxygen, but he couldn’t _move,_ as if his own body had betrayed him and gone into lockdown. A pressure greater than anything he’s ever known settled upon his chest and he knew that he wasn’t going to save anyone today. He could hear Hunk shouting behind him, but couldn’t distinguish anything more specific from it except panic. There was nothing beyond the striking beating of his own heart, like a set of drums right there in his ear. Lance’s eyes drifted down to the attitude indicator on the instrument panel, a black field of nothing coming in slowly from the corners of his eyes. Tunnel vision, his mind supplied, or unconsciousness. The artificial horizon kept spinning around and around, impossibly fast, and Lance wondered if maybe this was the last thing his dad saw before he crashed. Looking at it made falling from the sky feel inevitable.

_My battery is low,_ he thought as the mountain closed up on them through the windshield, _and it’s getting dark._

Lance closed his eyes.

He didn’t really remember Iverson aborting the simulation. He couldn’t remember Hunk scrambling out of his seat to make sure Lance wasn’t choking on something. He could definitely not remember all the other first year cadets gathering as close as they possibly could in the cockpit entrance to watch the whole spectacle, his own crew staring at him as if witnessing a real plane crash from afar. A few hours later the nurse in the med bayfinally told Lance what happened to him. Apparently he’d just had a panic attack, perhaps the pressure of acing his first flying simulation triggered something in his barely processed grief, induced maybe by stepping into a cockpit similar to the one his dad had died in only a couple of months prior. It didn’t really matter to Lance. It was humiliating either way. 

_Did you hear?_

The rumors spread through the Garrison quickly, echoing in the corridors as if they’d been whispered right into his own ear rather than behind his back.

_Lance McClain is afraid of heights_.

He couldn’t find the will or courage to correct them that his fear wasn’t necessarily about how high up in the air he found himself, but rather about how, inevitably, the only way down was towards the ground.

_Mayday, mayday, losing sight of the sky_.

Somehow, that felt even worse whispered out loud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: descriptive and bloody injuries, general existential crisis issues and wacky mental states, gets pretty dark and anxious though, (temporary) major character death by drowning will happen eventually with graphic description, minor character deaths (including that of a child), I think Pidge says fuck a few times? I guess there's minors having sex in this one but I have a very tasteful fade-to-black technique that relieves me of the distress of having to actually write the smut, also child soldiers?
> 
> I don't actually know when the next chapter will be up, see ya then


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